The Prince of Titania
by Eytar
Summary: Fox and friends join an ancient prince on a quest spanning billions of years to stop a time-traveling dragon from enslaving Lylat in the past, present and future. Contains m/m pairing yaoi and m/f. Falco x O.C., Fox x Krystal
1. Space Death Live

There once was a prince on the planet of Titania,

Who hid from the world as it succumbed to mass mania.

A great evil rose and delivered chaos to all,

Torched the skies and brought the planet to fall.

But what this evil wanted in the world's final hour,

Were the glorious Titanian bells of power.

But the queen hid the bells through time and space,

And gave the prince clues for each place.

For the bells sonorous chimes could destroy this evil,

Who wanted them to prevent his own upheaval.

But first, the prince must seek a hero to help fight,

And protect him in his tiresome plight.

The queen said upon a blue world in the future will be found,

That wonder, confusion, technology abound.

But to save their world, would be a hero so proud,

A young brilliant fox… by the name of McCloud.

* * *

**I**

Fox tapped his watch when Krystal dashed through the bedroom, holding her hair under a towel.

"Just give me five minutes," she said, leaning toward the mirror. She rubbed her cheeks and blinked and dug through the drawers looking for something.

"It's fine," Fox said. "Falco loves it when I show up late to his gigs." Fox went to the window of his bedroom, looking out at the view of Corneria City in the valley. Swarms of cars zipped across the skyways and around buildings twinkling in the evening light.

Krystal leaned back into the doorway and grimaced at Fox, then returned to the mirror to dash up her eyelashes. "You were the one who told me to get ready only thirty minutes ago." She studied her visage in the mirror, blinking, turning her head coyly and checking her profile. She let the towel go and combed through her blue hair with her fingers down to her shoulders, shaking it out, then ran a brush through it several times. She replaced the brush and reached for her lipstick. "There."

"There?" Fox called, pacing. "Does that mean ready?"

"Not yet," she puckered, running it along her lips, then pressing her lips together. Krystal capped the lipstick and fussed with her damp purple hair. She smoothed out her shimmery blue blouse which went up to her neck in different layers with a large collar. Her and Fox had been dating for over a month. "There," she said coming out of the bathroom smiling at him. Her wavy black skirt fell past her knees.

Fox smiled. "I guess it's worth the wait."

She grabbed her brown leather trenchcoat from the bed. "We can go."

"Wait wait," Fox said, walking to his closet. "I wanted to give you this." He returned with a small long box.

"What is it?" she asked, taking the box, checking Fox's face before gently pulling off the top. Inside was a simple necklace, a silver chain with a tiny little bell on it studded with small sparkling clear stones.

She looked up at him. "It's beautiful. I don't know what to say." She touched her lip.

Fox took the necklace and unclasped it. She straightened as his arms came around her. He put his hands under her hair where it touched her neck. The necklace was on and she touched the bell looking at it in her hand. She pinched it between her fingers and gave it a tiny shake- tinny little clangs. "It's cute and exactly my style." She looked up, surprised, and kissed him.

Fox pulled away. "We're going to be late."

Krystal led him to the door and gave the bell a little shake. "This isn't so you can hear me coming is it?"

Fox smirked. "I don't need a bell for that."

**-.-.-.-.-.-**

Falco held his keytar on the small stage of the bar, wearing all black. The rest of the band was setting up their equipment. He grumbled and looked around the thin crowd, most of them scattered around the bar trying to order drinks. The one robot working scrambled on his wheels back and forth. One feline at a small table closest to the stage stared at Falco with her arms crossed.

"Where the hell are they?" Falco growled under his breath.

"Who?" asked Rayet, the band's skinny ferret drummer. He tightened an electro-cymbal.

"Who do you think? Fox and the girl he's shacked up with."

"I think her name is Krystal."

"Yeah yeah, Krystal. Don't remind me." Falco mindlessly ran an arpeggio up his keytar which made no sound. "Hey Croy, plug me in."

Croy, a slightly overweight pig who played an instrument called the autotar, dug through the spaghetti mound of wires beside Rayet's drum set. He found his jack and plugged it into the largest amp.

Falco ran his arpeggio again and a sonic boom of sparkling synths and showers of distorted fuzz flooded the bar. People covered their ears. The feline, who was mid sip, threw her drink all over herself. The keytar's sparkling synths echoed and bounced back and forth, slowly fading until the bar was calm again.

Everyone stared at the stage, even the robot bartender. Rayet and Croy continued setting up their equipment not phased at all. Falco pushed his beak into the mic, "Testing," he whispered sexually. "Testing one-two-three." The feline in the audience dashed off to the lady's room fanning her soaked blouse. Her friends looked on with concern. Bar patrons returned to normal, shouting for drink orders like in a stock exchange.

Rayet smirked, "Alright hot stuff, let's not tick off too many people tonight."

Falco frowned and looked at his watch. "Screw it, let's just start. Fox'll just have to miss what will be my best. He knows the first five minutes is when I sing best."

Croy tapped Rayet and made a Falco face, yapping silently. They both snickered.

Falco readjusted his keytar and the strap over his shoulder.

Rayet slinked into his seat behind his array of drum pads. "Ready when you are captain." He twirled a drumstick over his fingers cool-like, until it slipped out, flying off his fingers, landing on the edge of the stage.

Falco closed his eyes as Croy stumbled over to get it. After another minute of settling, they got in their positions and Croy adjusted a few knobs on his autotar which was a stringed electric instrument played with a metal bow. It produced a deep grungy metallic sound. When played well that is.

Falco stepped up to the mic again and looked over the aimless crowds in the bar, looking at something high up. "Thanks for coming tonight. We are Space Death." The crowd mumbled uninterested.

Rayet banged his drum sticks together in the air, "One two three four!"

They slammed into loud rushing chords, a slamming running beat, comet tail synths that dived into each other. Conversation in the bar ceased possibility and patrons started half paying attention.

**-.-.-.-.-.-**

Fox helped Krystal out of the hovercab. The hole in the wall bar was across the street. "That's the place?" Krystal asked pulling her jacket together in the cold.

Fox rubbed her shoulders. "Yeah. It's cool. It's a chill place, I promise."

Krystal looked at him unsure then studied the flickering neon sign. "Bash's," she read. "Sounds painful."

When they entered, Space Death was on the third song of their set, a beat heavy song. Rayet freestyled through a stumbling fast beat, wildly swinging his arms over his head. Falco's hand moved up and down with his keytar playing chords while singing in a low hushed tone. Croy bobbed and stared at his feet while drawing a bow along his autotar's strings, producing a thick melancholy wash of noise.

"I'll get us drinks! Find us a good spot!" Fox pulled away from Krystal leaving her to stand in the middle of the bar. She watched Falco through the crowd and looked for a table, bobbing her head slightly.

Falco saw her and pointed to her past his microphone, looking at her while singing. She laughed and shook her head, trying to ignore it. She sat down at a small table in the corner and he pointed finger guns at her for a few more bars, then looked down at his keytar and went into a solo.

Krystal clasped her hands together on the small table and inspected the bar. The stage occupied almost a third of the room. The ceiling was low, the walls decorated with blue neon advertisements for different beers, cars and spacecraft. If it weren't for the loud rock playing, the bar would have a cool soothing aura. She fiddled with the blue candle light on the table. Fox found her and plopped down across from her. "Here, two Eledard drafts on tap. Just what you like."

"You're right," Krystal smiled, taking the beer. "This place is nice."

"As for the music." Fox looked sideways at the stage and Falco saluted him. Croy started his autotar solo. Fox waved. "I won't apologize for it, but I'm not sure what to say about it."

"It's… interesting," Krystal said.

The song drifted off to an end and there was scattered clapping. Falco put his beak on the microphone. "Thank you. Once again we are Space Death."

Krystal snorted into her beer glass, suppressing her laughter. The silence between songs was an oasis for people's ears and normal conversation.

Falco held his arm out to the ferret on drums. "Rayet Ret on electro-drums ladies and gentlemen." A few people clapped. Rayet grinned mischievously and twirled his sticks. Falco grasped the mic with both hands. "This next song was written for a dear old friend of mine, a close life-long friend who decided to show up fifteen minutes late to this show." A white spotlight flashed on Fox.

Fox pinched his forehead. "No," he muttered.

"This friend has been there with me through all these years, and has saved this planet's collective ass at least a few times, of course, not without my help and my piloting skills."

Croy rolled his eyes.

"But anyway, this one's for you Fox McCloud."

Krystal clapped as did the rest of the bar, the fullest applause of the night. "That's sweet," she said.

"He's been working on it since summer," Fox said painfully.

Falco tapped light gentle chords. His keytar was set to play a soft acoustic pluck.

"Fox McCloud," the bird sang flatly. The beat was gentle. "Oh Fox McCloud. Fox McCloud of Corneria. Saved us from hysteria. To teach us how live. Without this hysteria!" The song kicked into loud power chords. Green lights came on the band.

Fox rubbed his head. "Okay."

"Aw," Krystal nudged his leg. "It's nice. It's a really sweet gesture for him to write a song about you."

"What!" Fox cupped behind his ear in the screeching noise. "Speak louder!"

"I said it's a nice gesture!"

"Yeah I'm sure it is!"

Krystal grinned. "Though he did rhyme hysteria with hysteria!"

Fox laughed and drank his beer. The power chords and sonic assault ceased and returned to the gentle acoustic plucking. "Fox McCloud," Falco sang romantically. "Savior of Corneria. Savior from hysteria. Oh McCloud. Oooeeeooooh! Where do we find your wings? To lift us and protect our things. Once again."

Krystal put her beer down. "Protect our _things_? You say he's worked on this since summer?"

Fox shrugged. "He's not really a poet."

"Oooeeeooooh! Hey hey hey McCloud!" The power chords rose again into a lifting chorus and Fox's disenchanted smirk turned to a warm smile. He was touched.

In the back corner of the bar sat a lithe red fox with a drink. He was smaller than the average person and wore an absurd cloak with a ridiculous amount of jewelry on his wrists, around his neck, and on his ears. Gold clasps with red, purple and green jewels, silver piercings with small red stones. It would look like a costume if it weren't for the dark lighting of the bar. He was at full attention. His ears perked at each mention of the name McCloud, while they flinched from each razor sharp clash of keytar chords. He stared at Fox under the spotlight. Fox leaned and kissed Krystal on the cheek.

The song ended, sputtering off in atonal epic distortion. Falco pulled his keytar off and held it over his head as noise grumbled away. He thought about smashing the keytar into the stage, or Rayet's drum set, but then he remember he was borrowing it from a friend and thought against it. He put it back on and the noise came to an abrupt stop. Minimal clapping.

Falco kissed the microphone, "Thank you. We're going to take a ten minute smoke and get drunk break, but we'll be back." He pointed out at the audience, almost tracing his finger over each person as he panned from left to right. "But be prepared, for Space Death shall return."

Croy did a little riff on his autotar and the bar's normal lights came on and quiet house music started playing. The band settled their instruments and shuffled off the stage. Falco passed by Fox who started to say something. Falco put a hand in his face. Krystal blinked. "Wait," Falco said. "Space Death must get a drink from the bar. Then it will return to hear your thoughts, and your excuses." He walked on.

Krystal tried not to laugh. "What is up with him?"

Fox watched the bird stride to the bar trying to part people like waves. Some didn't budge, so he walked around them. "He gets like that at shows," Fox said. "But this is a sign that he's pleased with his performance… I think. I can't remember how to read Falco sometimes."

Rayet bounced up to their table, packing his cigarette pack into the palm of his hand with a constant tap tap tap. "So what'd you think, Fox?"

Fox took in a breath. "I thought the drumming was awesome," he exhaled. Rayet beamed. Tap tap tap. Fox looked at Krystal for judgment. "And. On the fourth song, I really liked those little flicks you did on the snares. Disjointed but it added to the whole out of control feeling the song had."

Rayet bounced. Tap tap tap. "That's exactly what I was going for! I had been working those out for weeks. I'm psyched you noticed." Tap tap tap.

Krystal nodded in agreement. "It was fantastic."

Tap tap tap, then Rayet realized someone was sitting across from Fox. "Oh hey, Krystal?"

Fox said, "Rayet, I can't remember if you've met Krystal or not."

"Yeah we met. Of course. At your birthday party like three weeks ago. How's it been hanging, Krystal?"

"Things are well." She brushed a strand of hair from her face. "Just hanging out. Fox and I have been doing some air training, nothing too extreme."

"Really cool. You guys need to hang out with us more, hit some clubs, or just come over to our place some time, just chill, watch movies, I don't know."

"Yeah." Krystal looked at Fox. "We should do that some time. I don't get to see enough of Fox's friends."

Fox drank from his beer and looked elsewhere.

"Sweet, yeah, alright," Rayet nodded. "I gotta go smoke." He shook the cigarette pack in his little hand. "I am going to freak out if I don't get some nicotine in the next two minutes!"

"Cool, we'll be here for the rest of the set." Fox raised his beer to him as he bounced off.

When Rayet was out of earshot, Krystal dropped her arm on the table, "That is a good question. How come I don't ever see _your_ friends?"

Fox looked somewhere else again and breathed out his nose. "It's not like." He thought of words. "I just don't think they're really your scene."

"And what is my scene?" Her eyebrow rose.

"I don't know. The kind of clubs they go to aren't really your... I mean _our_ kind of clubs. Or we could hang out at their place some time, but you'll see it's just going to be us sitting there, making fun of old movies, playing cards or watching music videos, or watching the news and making fun of that while drinking. I don't want to bore you."

"What do you mean? That sounds awesome. Fox, if we're going to know each other, you can't be afraid to let me into your life a little bit." She suddenly cringed, "And I don't bore easily. I'm enjoying myself tonight with you. I don't see how it would be any different elsewhere, as long as I'm with you."

Fox took her hands in his. "Alright, if you put it that way, we'll all hang out some time. We'll go to the hot springs or something. Could be fun." They leaned toward each other, muzzles almost touching over the blue candle.

Falco came up and slapped Fox on the back. His nose shot forward right into Krystal's. Hard.

"Falco," Fox growled.

Krystal grabbed her nose, cringing. "Okay."

Falco swooped a chair over to the table. "Woah! Sorry guys." He winked at Fox and sat in the chair backwards, knees spread. "Krystal, how's it hanging? Need some ice for that nose?"

She snorted and sipped her beer. "No it's fine."

"Fantastic. I thought so. So! Tell me! " He rolled his fingers on the table like drumsticks. "What's the verdict?"

Krystal sat up. "Well. I thought." She looked at Fox for an opinion.

Falco slammed the table. "It was horrible. Awful. Tragic. Wasn't it?"

"No of course not."

"It was crap! Pure unadulterated crap. Did you notice that mess up in the third song… oh yeah, first song for you guys, you late slow pokes. Well did you notice it? I did the progression for the first chorus, not the second, and it just screwed up Croy, and it was just crap."

"I didn't really notice," Fox said.

"How could you not notice?" Falco squawked. "It was a nova bomb of catastrophic proportions. It's completely ruined the set. I don't even think I can play the rest now."

Fox and Krystal blinked at each other. Falco turned his head, so his ear faced them, waiting for the flood of conciliatory compliments to brighten his spirits up.

"Really," Fox said. "Falco. You were great."

Krystal said at the same time, "Falco, you were awesome."

Fox said, "And that song you did for me. Hearing it tonight. I have to say. Best performance of it I've heard yet."

Falco blinked and rubbed his eyebrow and grabbed Fox's hand. "You really think so? I know. I think you're right. It was good. No it was damn good. No! In fact! This is our best damn show yet!"

Croy came over with the biggest mug of beer possible at the bar. He gulped half of it. "Wooo! If you think the show's been good so far. It's just going to get better after this. All aboard!" He gulped the rest down then wiped his lip.

Krystal watched, astonished.

Falco smacked the pig's large belly. "Could you please! You're just going to get drunk and sloppy and when you do that you play too loud and drown my voice out."

Croy patted his stomach, pushing it out for emphasis. "Ooee, that voice of yours could use some drowning out."

Falco glared at him. "What! What did you say?"

Krystal leaned over the table toward the large pig. "Croy, I absolutely love that instrument you play. What is it called again?"

Croy had his bow tucked into his belt. He pulled it out and twirled it. "The autotar m'lady. And I hope its sonorous pleasures happen to pleasure you."

Krystal laughed almost coyly, looking into her beer mug.

Fox narrowed his eyes. "Alright hot shot."

Croy tapped the bow on the tip of Fox's nose. "And pleasure for you too good sir." He laughed.

Falco grabbed Croy's bow and shoved it back under his belt. "Don't touch people's noses with your bow. It's just going to get condensation and sweat on it, and it's going to make the sound too high and crisp and it's just going to-"

"Drown your voice out?" Krystal finished.

Falco snapped to her. "Yes." He smiled highly. "10 points to Krystal."

Rayet came bouncing over, coming up behind Falco and rubbing his shoulders. "So you guys ready to do this?"

Falco put his drink on another table, then leaned back into Rayet's comforting hands. "Yes, just do this for three more minutes."

Rayet drummed on Falco's head. "No! I want to play more now!"

"Alright alright!" Falco cried, getting up, smoothing his feathers. "Sheesh. You crazy nut, let's go put that nicotine rush into some drums."

"Yay!" Rayet bounced through tables to the stage, slamming his hands on chairs and tables as he went along.

Croy pulled away from the table, pulling his bow out again. "Thanks for coming to see us guys," he said to Fox and Krystal.

"No problem."

"Yeah, it's been fun."

Fox sighed relieved when they were gone. "Sorry about that."

"No, don't be sorry. They're funny."

Fox shook his head and drank some more, but found his mug to be empty. "Yeah sometimes, in small doses. I'm going to get more. Did you want the same?"

"Yeah sure."

Fox pushed his way into the crowded bar space, trying to get himself up to the counter. But before he could order his drink, the news on the holoscreens above the bar caught his attention. He couldn't believe what he was seeing.

Soon other people saw, and were just looking up.

Falco on the stage coughed into the microphone. "Space Death returns." But few were listening.

Fox pointed at the bartender then the screens above. "Hey can you turn that up! Something's happening!"

The robot looked at the screens and saw the explosions and upped the volume, watching as well.

"…could only describe as a large black orb, came out of the orbital gate in an unauthorized passage, from unknown origin, attacking everything, and is now heading down toward Corneria."

The image replaying was of the orbital gate, calm, serene, glowing green, spaceships milling about, until the gate lit up and a massive cloud of dark energy flew out. It discharged bright white bolts from itself at everything around it. The gate, other ships, another research station in the distance, all exploding in tremendous fireballs. Then the lightning filled energy zoomed off at incredible speed down toward planet on its night side. Toward Corneria City.

"Authorities are urging viewers not to panic. The Viceroys have already authorized General Peppy Hare to send in a squadron to intercept the attacking alien entity. We go live now to Air Base Alpha to get more information from…"

"How have you come back now Andross?" Fox growled, determined. "What is it you still want from us?"

Bar patrons were uneasy, looking around. Unsure if they should leave, go home, get somewhere safe.

Falco on stage slapped the microphone several times, making loud thumps. "Is this thing on?"

A small hand grabbed Fox's arm. Fox swerved, looking at the red furry hand, following the arm to the jeweled short red fox standing against him.

"He's here," said the small fox with such terrified urgency. "He's here and he knows you're here."

"Who? Who knows I'm here?"

There was a violent rumble in the ground, the walls. Bottles fell off shelves smashing onto the robot bartender and the ground. Fox looked around, slightly ducking. People were now shuffling out of the bar in a mumbling panic, some faster than others.

"You must come with me quickly." the red fox said. "There is no time to explain. We must leave immediately."

Krystal pushed through the crowd up to Fox, scared. "Fox what's going on. What's happening?" she asked holding her jacket together.

Fox grabbed her arm, and when her jacket came apart and her small sparkling necklace with the bell came into view, the red fox's eyes lit up.

He grabbed the bell while it was still around her neck and beamed. "Thank the gods! It's here! You have it!"

"Hey!" Krystal cried.

Fox shoved him back. "Alright, I'm not going for this at all. You need to tell me what the hell is going on."

By now the bar was empty except for them and the robot bartender. Falco, Rayet, and Croy rushed up with their instruments. "What's going on?" Rayet asked. "Earthquake or something?" The ground rumbled again.

"No. Some sort of energy. I think it's Andross," Fox said.

"Well that's great," Falco grumbled. "Right in my show of course."

"No!" the red fox shouted. "It is an evil unimaginable. And it will destroy everything in its path until it finds us. Which is why we must leave immediately."

"Leave?" Fox asked reaching for his communicator in his jacket. "Where do we go? No, the first thing I'm doing is calling-"

The red fox grabbed Fox's arms. "No! You must join me on a journey through time and space! You are apart of a three-hundred million year old destiny to save the planet of Titania, the civilization of the Anuas, to stop the evil Arc Ycrio from enslaving our planet and this entire system in his quest for power!"

Everyone stared at the red fox.

"Okay," Fox said, holding his communicator. "We'll get to those things in a second, just…" He pinched his forehead. "Just… just tell me who you are."

The red fox put his hand on his jeweled cloak. "I am Prince Orbion of Titania."

"Titania?" Falco huffed. "Who are you the prince of? There hasn't been a soul living on that planet for…"

The red fox turned to the bird and said, "For three-hundred million years."

"Orbion," Fox said. "Is that like a first or last name?"

The prince jumped. "We don't have time to discuss these things! Arc Ycrio is here, and he's going to destroy everything-"

"Everything in his path yeah we got that part."

Krystal touched Fox's arm and eyed the red fox carefully. "Fox I think we should listen to him. He's most definitely who he says he is. I'm not sensing any deception at all."

"What about insanity?" Rayet asked.

The red fox glared at the ferret.

Krystal said, "No nothing at all. He's also most definitely psychic. I've never felt such power before."

The red fox looked at her. "I can see why the destiny would mark you McCloud to join me. I see here a band of capable explorers and warriors, varied and courageous." He looked around the group.

Croy shook it off. "I don't know what you're talking about. I just play autotar."

There was a stronger rumble in the ground. Neon signs in the bar fell off the walls, sparks popping out as they shattered. The robot mindlessly stopped cleaning broken bottles and headed for the signs. The sound of fighter jets thundered overhead, low above the buildings, things shaking again, power flickering.

Fox looked around, then at Krystal who reassured him with her eyes, then back at Prince Orbion. "Alright. What do we do first?"


	2. Escape From

To GamerJay: Thanks. Actually, Falco can't sing. But he likes to think he can.

**II**

Outside of the bar, the group found utter chaos. Traffic was at a standstill, on the ground and on several skyways above. People ran through the maze of vehicles in the street.

"This is not good," Falco said.

"Look over there!" Krystal pointed down into the valley, where downtown Corneria City was, glass skyscrapers rising out of the lush dense forests. Another volley of fighter jets screamed overhead, into the valley. Emergency vehicles buzzed aimlessly around buildings.

They all slowly looked upward and saw it, the lightning filled black cloud encroaching upon the city.

The prince turned swiftly, "We have to get to your ship and get off this-"

A deafening roar boomed through the valley and up the mountain sides. Everyone covered their ears, felt it in their chests. The ground shook, thousands of bolts shot from the cloud, into buildings, aimlessly into the mountains, one zapping toward them, shooting overhead, creating shadows. Krystal screamed and threw herself into Fox's hold. Downtown lit up in brilliant mushrooms of fire, glass buildings exploding out like shattering raindrops. The valley darkened as every light, buildings, towers, streets, flickered out. Rivers of flames spider-webbed through the valley, roaring through darkened buildings illuminated by car headlights, blasting through everything. Smaller bolts zapped from the cloud, striking random fighter jets in the sky, sending them careening into the mountains and the city, some blowing up before they even hit the firestorm below.

"Dear God!" Fox shouted, unable to hear his own voice. The power outage swept up the ridges, grids blacking out one by one, thumping past them, up the mountains. "We're being annihilated!"

The prince grabbed Fox by the arms again, trying to shout at him, but the wind and the roaring created only a whispering mouth, curtained in windswept red hair. "Fox! You have to understand! This is all inconsequential! You have to understand that this is only one timeline, one universe out of infinity! We can stop this! But we have to live first! We have to get off the planet! We have to get to your ship!"

Fox, still holding Krystal close, turned to look at their small group. Falco, Rayet, and Croy were terrified, holding their instruments. People in the street now ran in screaming car lit panic around them. A small few were brave enough to simply watch the orange glow from the edge of the ridge, standing in statue-still awe. Cars above ignored the designated skyways and were now criss-crossing dangerously, scattering through the sky.

"Fox!" The prince shouted. "Your ship!"

Fox nodded, rather dazed, looking around. "We came in a cab. I don't know, we could-"

Rayet pushed forward, "We'll take the band van!"

"Band van?" The prince questioned.

"Yeah! It can hold all of us for sure!"

"We don't have a choice!" Falco yelled. "C'mon on!"

Once in the air, they zoomed away from the city into the dark forests and suburbs. Luckily the hangars that held the Great Fox at Air Base Beta were far away from downtown. Rayet drove and Falco sat in the passenger seat. Fox, Krystal, and Prince Orbion were in the back seat, while Croy sat cramped in the back with miscellaneous band equipment, the rest of which was still in the bar.

"So that's what this Arc Ycrio does?" Fox questioned to no one, rage brimming. "He just destroys things aimlessly? That's how he gets things done? He doesn't talk? He doesn't reason?"

Prince Orbion was sitting right next to him. "Yes. Fox I'm sorry your planet is falling victim to this evil."

"You're sorry? I can't even think of how many people just died right now, in the past twenty minutes."

"You have to understand," the prince said. "Those people are only dead once."

"What the hell are you talking about?!" Fox shouted. "Dead once?!"

"Fox please," Krystal cooled.

"No! I'm tired of this vague double talk. Once someone dies, they're gone! That's it! There is no second or third or fourth."

"No," the prince said. "Just infinity. Which I suppose you can't comprehend."

Fox exhaled in disgust. "And what the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Exactly my point," the prince said.

"Guys!" Krystal scolded. "We can't do this. We can't be fighting like this. Fox, even if you weren't apart of this destiny Prince Orbion speaks of, you'd still be doing everything in your power to stop this cloud, this Arc Ycrio, right?"

"Of course. I'd be in the air right now taking it down."

"Right, but you can't. It wouldn't work. We've seen its power. You'd be killed. And right now you feel helpless because you know that fighting him in your usual form, which is in an Arwing, wouldn't work. As a result you're getting defensive and it's helping no one."

"Thanks for the analysis."

Krystal put her hands on Fox's arm, urging him. "So I think we should follow what Prince Orbion says, and right now he says to get off Corneria. So let's just do that, and not fight okay?"

They were silent.

"Great," Krystal said sitting back, hugging herself. "I'm glad we could agree on that."

After a few beats of silence, just the rumble of the hovermotor, Rayet spoke up. "So what does this Arc Ycrio want? What is he after? Why does he want to kill you and destroy Titania?"

"He doesn't want to destroy Titania," the prince said. "He wants power. He wants to enslave Lylat in as many multiverses and timelines as possible and he needs the Titanian bells to do that. And he wants to kill me because I'm the only one who can stop him."

"Bells?" Krystal echoed. She touched her necklace. "That's why you were interested in this, my necklace."

"Yes," the prince said. "The bell on your necklace contains one-fourth of the power needed to destroy Arc Ycrio."

Fox rubbed his face. "How is that even possible? I bought that necklace in a pawn shop."

Krystal slinked away from him. "You bought it where?"

"Uh oh," Falco mumbled.

Fox cringed. "I mean. Well yeah, I bought it in a pawn shop. But it's not like I went there thinking I'd get you a gift there… per say. I was just browsing, and the moment I saw this necklace I knew you'd like-"

"You couldn't go to an actual jewelry store?"

Fox was tongue tied. "I. Well. I mean look how special it turned out! Sweetheart, you're wearing one-fourth of the power needed to save Lylat."

"I don't like being called sweetheart. This could have been stolen from someone, or something else awful. That's how things land up in a pawn shop."

Prince Orbion spoke up. "You shouldn't blame Fox for the location he bought you this necklace. He didn't find the necklace. The necklace found him. I'm quite sure it was the Queen of Titania who placed it in a location where Fox would encounter it."

"Right," Krystal huffed. "A place like a pawn shop, where Fox would buy me something."

Fox looked at the prince. "Nice try, thanks."

Rayet looked over his shoulder, "Do I have to turn this van around guys? C'mon."

Krystal dropped her hands onto her skirt. "You know what, it's fine. It doesn't matter. It's the thought that counts. Thank you Fox. Thank you for the necklace."

Croy did a bad Krystal impression, going high-voiced and proper, "Yes Fox, thank you for buying me this piece of crap necklace that's dragged us into this three gazillion year old quest."

They turned slowly around to look at him.

"Joking!" Croy stammered, scooting back. "I was joking. Ignore me. I'm drunk."

Falco cut in, "Okay. I got a question, Prince uh… Orbion, Orby, Orb. Can I call you Orb?"

"You can."

"Cool. Orb. We're fine with taking off in the Great Fox and everything, but you don't have a ship of your own or anything? I mean, how did you get here?" Falco watched the red fox in his flip down mirror.

The prince said, "I came here in a glapherim."

"Glapherim?" Krystal asked.

"It's a form of travel my people use… well, used, back at the peak of our civilization. We were space faring. The glapherim is a glass like orb, but not glass, it's a form of energy. It can travel with another form of energy. I'm not sure how to explain it, but it goes where you think."

They were silent for a moment. Croy broke the silence. "…Where you think what?"

"No I mean literally, where you think. It goes to a location you think of."

"Oh! I'm dumb," Croy leaned back. "I'm just going to sit back here and not talk."

"Sounds cool," Rayet said in the front. "So can we escape in that too?"

"I'm afraid not. A glapherim is just big enough to hold one of my people. It might be possible to squeeze in one more person, but it just wouldn't be pleasant, especially not for a long journey. And from what I understand if two people are in one glapherim and they think of two different places, they'll be instantly destroyed."

"Great." Fox scratched his head, using a new calmer voice. "So this glapherim, it travels through time too?"

"Yes, though, this is actually the first time I've ever traveled through time, at least beyond a hundred years."

"Great, that's reassuring. Now I have a question. It's simple. It comes from my simple mind after all."

"Alright."

"Okay, if we're going on a journey where we have to travel through time, how exactly do we accomplish that in the Great Fox. I'm not sure if you know this, but us Cornerians, here in this time period at least, don't have time travel."

The prince didn't skip a beat. "The mechanics of it are quite simple. Any vessel with the right kind of power is able to traverse time. I think I'll be able to do the same for your Great Fox."

"You think?" Fox questioned. "So you don't know for sure?" Krystal was about to start saying something, but Fox stopped her. "Alright alright, I won't complain anymore. I'll just go with the flow, helpless, like you said."

There was silence again for a while, hovermotor switching gears. This time Prince Orbion spoke up. "Are we near to where this Great Fox is?" he asked anxiously.

"Yeah," Fox said looking out the window, down at the hundreds of small houses all exact copies of each other, sitting on idyllic suburban streets with their perfect square backyards. Some had lights on, some off. He imagined families crowded around their holosets, holding their loved ones close in uneasy fear, others sleeping, oblivious. Fox turned away, "Why? What else is going to happen? Are we running out of time in some way?"

The prince shifted and said nothing.

Fox didn't like that. "Look buddy, if I'm going to follow you around blindly on some quest that I just learned about less than an hour ago, you gotta start telling me everything. You can't hold things back."

The prince resisted. "It seems like the more I tell you, the angrier you get."

Fox sighed, "I'm not angry. I didn't mean to blow up at you earlier." Fox hadn't noticed before, but the prince was young, couldn't have been older than 18, and he was small and vulnerable, like anyone else in this situation. "Look, I'm sorry. Just tell me what's going on. That's all I ask."

The prince fiddled with one of his earrings, uneasy. "Alright. I believe when Arc Ycrio gets through destroying the cities on this planet, and when he is unable to sense my death, he'll destroy the planet itself and move on."

Falco dropped something, "Woah woah."

"Wait what?!" Rayet yipped, keeping his eyes on the horizon.

Croy leaned forward, "What did he say?"

Fox was stunned. Krystal asked, "How is that possible? How is it possible to destroy a planet?"

"Destroy the planet?!" Falco echoed.

The prince shrugged uneasily. "I'm afraid, his power is… indescribable. It would be draining on him, he'd be forced to change into his corporeal form for some time afterward, but he knows I'm here and I believe he'd do it, to make sure I'm killed."

Falco leaned to Rayet, "Can't this thing go any faster?"

"I've got my foot to the floor!" the ferret cried.

"Don't panic guys," Krystal said. "We're almost there, right Fox?"

"Yeah," he said looking out the window again, "Just a few more minutes."

Rayet looked at something in the distance, then squinted.

"What?" Falco asked.

The ferret leaned forward, looked normally, then he squinted again.

"What is it? Stop that, you're making me nervous."

Rayet pointed out the window to the right, to their north. "What is that?"

Everyone looked out the right side. A swarm of twinkling lights were coming over the mountains, fast, brightening.

"He's found us?!" Croy squealed from the back.

"No!" Fox shouted. "Rayet drop altitude!"

"What?!"

"It's not him," the prince said, mystified for the first time. "But I feel hundreds, hear hundreds, panicking, like a pack of wild animals."

"No," Krystal said. "It's people fleeing the city and we better get out of their way, Rayet!"

Rayet shoved the wheel forward and the van whined, pitching forward, screaming toward the ground. Everyone grabbed their seats. "Hold on!" Rayet shouted over his shoulder. Croy had barely anything to hang on to, and the equipment in the back floated upward, spare drum pads, a bass guitar, bumped into the ceiling. They leveled out, things falling to the floor. The sound of blaring horns pitched over them, the bright sparkling swarm roaring above in disconnected chaos, alternating white and red light on them. Rayet looked up, watching them rocket by.

"Rayet!" Falco squawked and grabbed the dashboard. A chimney flew by. The bottom of the van skirted someone's roof, ripping up tiles in a quick scrape. Everyone cried and the van rocked upward then down again, hitting another roof, digging up tiles, leaving a wake as they bounced.

"Pull up!" Falco cried. Shingles hit the windshield, cracking it.

"I'm trying!" The skinny ferret growled, tugging on the wheel as hard he could. Krystal ducked and covered. Prince Orbion latched onto Fox, surprising him. Fox didn't think, just grabbed him tightly with one arm and covered Krystal's head with his other. Croy bounced helplessly in the back.

Falco fell over Rayet and grabbed the wheel, yanking it up. The van soared upward, broken tiles on the hood sliding off into the night below.

"Sorry guys!" Rayet cried, checking the rear-view mirror, seeing the scarred suburban roofs. Several windows lit up. "Wow! That was scary. And kind of cool."

Falco looked at Rayet. "Hey you know what else is cool. Not dying."

Prince Orbion slowly slid his arms off Fox. "I'm sorry."

"No you're okay. You okay?"

He pushed his long red hair out of his face, nodding. "Yes."

Krystal rubbed her face. "Don't mind me. I'm fine over here." Fox moved his arm around her, pulling her close.

He saw Croy out of the corner of his eye. "Hey you okay back there."

"Ouch, yeah," he groaned, lying on his back. "That's gonna bruise in all kinds of places."

Fox checked the window again and saw the neighborhoods give way to an expanse of neatly trimmed grass bathed in moonlight, then a sea of cement, surrounded by fences, tarmacs, security gates, control towers. "I think we're here."

"Thank god," Croy groaned from the back.

On the ground, they scampered out of the van, dashing toward one of the largest hangars. They ran across what felt like a kilometer of pavement until they reached the doors. Croy caught up with them heaving. "Guys. I vote. No more. Running."

The prince took off his cloak, his sweat catching the cold night air. "There's no time. How fast can you get this ship in space?"

Falco punched numbers into an alphanumeric keypad. It buzzed. Access denied. "You gotta be kidding me!"

Krystal rung her hands. "Great."

Fox pushed him aside. "You're using the wrong password. That's the old one," he grumbled, input numbers, and it beeped happily. Locks unlatched within the massive doors, and motors whirred up. The doors began to part and they all ran to the opening, entering the dark void. Croy grumbled.

"Okay, that was scary for a moment," Rayet said, voice echoing.

"Fox," the prince said. "How fast can you get this ship-"

"I heard you. Ten minutes, maybe fifteen. There are boot up procedures for the main computer, and then the anti-grav systems have to synchronize. The ship hasn't been launched in months."

Falco flipped levers and floodlights came to life with loud shunks. Shunk. Shunk. Shunk, casting a white fluorescent glow on The Great Fox, five stories high, with its clean white deck panels and razor sharp angles.

"Impressive," the prince said. "And hopefully fast."

"Fast is a cosmic understatement," Fox admired, starting a dash up to the ramp to the main Arwing bay at the front of the ship. They followed. "And I know we have to rush, but when you throw in little comments like that, it makes me nervous."

Rayet bounced up the ramp next to Falco, "Well this is exciting. I've never gotten to fly in this big thing before!"

"It's not that great," Falco said. "You'd enjoy an Arwing more."

Croy heaved as he climbed. "Guys. I vote. No ramps. Either."

Rayet jumped. "Wait! The van! We should bring that along. It'll fit in here."

"We can't waste time," Krystal said.

"Hey," Falco said. "You never know, the band van comes in handy."

Rayet got the van while the rest took the lift to the bridge, the doors opening to a white clean control center with smooth panels and computer consoles, cushioned seats in every station facing the large forward window.

Fox dashed to the captain's chair in the center of the bridge, plopping in. He pulled a console toward him, fingers dancing on buttons. "Alright, Falco take the helm, Krystal, I need you to take tactical and weapons. Croy, you operate scanners and intelligence."

"First time for everything!" the pig beamed.

Falco and Krystal were already at their stations, poking around, familiar with the systems. Computer screens warmed to life, some flickering on, consoles lighting up all around.

Prince Orbion felt lost, barely standing outside the lift. Fox looked over at him. "Prince, you can sit right here." Fox patted the chair next to him.

"Oh." The prince walked carefully toward it, down a short set of steps. "Is there a special technical duty I have to do in this chair?"

"Yeah, be the honored guest, and put your seatbelt on."

The prince complied, the whole time, quietly willing them to rush as fast as they could. Time was running out. He closed his eyes, seeing time threads, millions of glowing strings dancing with each other. Some started to disappear.

The lift doors opened and Rayet hopped in. "Alright! We're set!"

Fox pointed, "Rayet, take the operations station."

"Aye aye captain!" At the station, he wiggled his fingers in the air over buttons, then looked behind him and saw only more control panels. "Hey how come I don't get a chair."

"This is odd," Krystal said, tapping her console. "The anti-grav matrix is synced. Engine core is hot."

Falco grimaced at his helm controls. "This baby's all ready to fly." He turned in his seat to look at Fox. "I don't know how that's even possible."

A door on the other side of the bridge shot up and a seven foot robot marched in. "What is going on here?" came the monotone voice.

Everyone jumped and Prince Orbion yelped out of his trance.

"What is that?!" Rayet cried, holding his chest.

"It's ROB!" Falco said to the ferret. "You've met him before."

"Oh, whew," he exhaled. "That's right. I forget things easily."

"ROB!" Fox jumped out of his seat. "What are you doing here?"

The robot stepped into the bridge, and approached the operations station where Rayet stood. The ferret jumped aside and ROB's hands flew over buttons.

Rayet rested his chin on ROB's arm and studied his fast finger work. "Oh, that's why this one doesn't have a chair."

ROB pushed the ferret's face off his arm, then looked up. "When this attack began, I calculated a 77 percent probability you would come here to pilot the Great Fox in either an aerial assault or spatial bombardment."

"Remind me to thank my dad some time for building you."

"A reminder will be given in 36 hours."

Prince Orbion slowly stood in awe of the machine. "Your technology." He turned his head slightly to Fox, not taking his eyes off the tall robot working the controls. "You can create life?"

"In a sense," Fox said carefully. "ROB is a mechanical form of life, designed by a company, Arspace Dynamics. He's a big help and can interface directly with the ship."

ROB looked at the prince, his dark red eyes scanning over the small decorated fox. His fingers still whirred over buttons. "I am alive. But unlike most organic life, I'm able to perform 6 trillion calculations in a 2 nanosecond buffer. This allows me to ensure optimal operation of The Great Fox Mark II." He looked at Fox again. "Duro-injectors are primed. The core is ready to be initiated."

"You heard the robot," Fox said to Falco. "Start the launch sequence. Prince, you're gonna want to sit down."

He sat and at first there was a high rushing noise, then a deep whirr, then a rumble. Krystal looked up, "I've got a 1 to 10 anti-grav ratio."

Fox turned. "Croy, open the launch doors."

The pig's hands hovered over graphical buttons on the interface. "Okay, how do I do that."

Krystal looked over. "It's the large blue button."

He bit his lip. "I don't see it. Where is it?"

Krystal took a step and pointed, "It's right… it's right there. It's the one that says open launch doors."

"Oh!" Croy laughed and poked the button.

Prince Orbion sat with his arms crossed, rocking back and forth.

Fox checked his console, "Something's wrong. The startup sequence has idled." The prince's movement distracted him. "Everything okay?" he asked.

The prince suddenly grabbed both arm rests, digging his claws into them. "No," he groaned deeper, in a strange voice. "I can sense him, he's trying to find me. But he can't… sense me. He can't find me. He's…"

Krystal looked up at him. Falco turned around. Croy and Rayet looked with concern. ROB stared.

Fox watched the prince's claws tear across the arm rests. "You have to fight it. Don't let him."

"He is…" The red fox inhaled, sucking air in hard. "The anger. He's enraged. He can't find me. But he can see our time string."

"What? What the hell is a time string?"

"He can see it, our future, our success. He's going to destroy the planet." He looked at Fox, terrified. "There's no more time. He's doing it right now."

Fox glared at Falco. "Alright, we have to get out of here."

"It's withering away," the prince continued in a daze.

The ground rumbled, but it wasn't the engines. Krystal looked up, checking the bulkheads, then her console. "ROB I think I found the problem, it's an-"

"Injector variance. I see it," he swung to another panel and a small lid slid off the console. He pulled an output jack out of his wrist and plugged it into a slot.

The ground rumbled again. Deck panels shook.

"Launch doors, fully open," Croy said. "It's a clear sky above."

ROB's eyes flickered. "Variance corrected. Launch sequence initiating."

This time there was a roar, strong vibrations rippling up and down. The prince clenched his armrests, closing his eyes, trying to visualize their escape, seeing their timelines, their survival, strings of energy flying into a void, flickering out, withering into oblivion, swallowed up. But one time string still shined brightly, shooting past the void, shooting off into the future. Just one. One chance out of billions, trillions. The ship rumbled out of the hangar, rising slowly at first just on anti-gravity, then the main boosters kicked on, the ship rumbling stronger.

"Everything looks good," Falco said, both his hands on the control panel.

Holographic overlays came over the front window, over the view of the dense forests and mountains in the distance. The ship turned, toward the city. Krystal gasped. There was a turbulent firestorm glowing on the horizon. But no sign of the dark cloud.

"Where is he?" Fox asked. "Where did he go?"

"He's far above," the prince whispered painfully.

"I've got him on scanners," Croy said. "I think. At least there's a large energy source 600 kilometers above the surface, in orbit, day side. It's growing."

"Initiating escape booster sequence," ROB droned.

"There's no time," the prince said to no one. Fox glared at him.

The ship pitched upward, engines powering up, energy humming into higher tones, then they rocketed off at incredible speed, flying past the mountains, over the firestorm, high into the night sky. Everyone shook in their seats.

Hazy night clouds gave way to crystal clear stars.

"100 kilometers," Fox said. "Ascent is good. Armor temperature at 2,000 Kelvin, rising. Falco, I need you to get us out of here as fast as possible without blowing out the engines." The first lick of sunlight swept over the hull.

"I see it!" Croy shouted into his console. "The cloud, it's dead ahead!" ROB transferred the image to the main viewer. An intense blinding beam of energy was connecting Solar far off in the distance, traversing millions of miles across space, straight into the dark cloud, hovering above the atmosphere. Several military attack ships were closing in on the cloud, firing weapons at it. It simply swallowed the lasers and missiles up, but strangely, the cloud ignored the ships themselves. The beam of energy from Solar filled and engulfed it, and the cloud glowed intensely bright yellow, tightening into a perfect sphere, a new sun.

Falco pounded his control console, and the ship tilted right, zooming past the blinding light, rocketing out of the atmosphere. Military ships veered off in different directions getting out of the Great Fox's way.

"What the hell is it doing?!" Fox cried.

The prince saw it coming and covered his eyes, seeing all their threads disappear. "We're not going to make it."

The new sun zapped a beam of hot yellow light into the planet below. Like getting shot with a bullet, the beam blasted out the other side of Corneria, a raging ocean of fire spilling across the atmosphere on both ends. The beam ceased and bright fissures formed in the planet, cracking, breaking apart until it erupted, shattering in the most brilliant explosion. The shockwave filled with vaporized oceans, continents, pure energy, rushed toward the ship.

Fox lost his words. "Falco," his voice shook. "Light speed now."

"It! It won't initiate!" Falco shouted.

The prince leapt out of his chair and threw himself at Krystal's console, ripping her necklace off, holding the bell up in the air with both hands. He shook it. Each clang boomed, deafening.

The shockwave hit the ship, bowing around it furiously.

Everything shook violently, consoles and lights exploded, bulkheads ripping off the ceiling crashing through the floors, cables falling out, sparks engulfing the bridge. Falco flew out of his seat. Fox hung on for dear life. Rayet was tossed like a rag doll over his console. Prince Orbion floated calmly above the floor with the bell in his outstretched hands. It clanged on its own, fast, vibrating, now with a sonorous pleasant hum. The shockwave took the ship with it, throwing it through space, roaring over the bubble of protective energy that pulsed around the hull. The wave reached its peak, rushing past them, fading into fast moving rocky debris. The roaring wave washed away into the darkness of space, leaving them behind.

The ship was adrift, the bridge, dark and quiet.

The bell glowed white hot. It slipped from the prince's shaking rigid fingers and hit the floor with a little tingle, rolling over the thin broken chain of the necklace. It faded to its normal sparkle. The prince's fur smoked, two tendrils rising from his ears. He exhaled and fell over, collapsing into the debris covered floor.

But before he passed out, he saw their time string. Shooting off into the future.

**-.-.-.-.-.-**

The small white hot sun, cooled back to the dark cloud, and then it spun itself down, withering into a new lower form. A body, a shape, with wings, a long anchoring tail, black scales, twice the size of a normal person.

He hovered calmly in space, in the debris field where Corneria once was, his gold eyes studying it, looking around. The sunlight of Solar glistened off his oily black scales. He picked up a small rock floating by, looking at it carefully, then letting it go on its merry way. His eyes looked elsewhere, closing, then opening, pained at the sight of a single string zooming off into a multiverse of its own, disappearing out of his mind's view. For a flicker, he saw Prince Orbion in it. Alive.

A slight touch of anger crept in, at the back of his neck, rising around to the edges of his eyelids, down to his teeth. Another rock floated by. He plucked it from its journey, and this time, he crushed it.

* * *

If with the hero you flee, from the horrid blast, 

Then your journey through time, still remains vast.

I give you my love my son, love unsurpassed.

I know in my heart, this journey you shall outlast.

See ocean in the future. See land in the past.

Find the King of Aquas, and find him, find him fast.


	3. To Aquas

**III**

A large asteroid drifting through space sliced clean over a wing of the Great Fox, ripping off tiles with it. Showers of varying rocks swam by the battle scarred ship, a few more breaking over the hull. The ship floated onward, passing into a field of larger wandering asteroids. The remains of Corneria, a hazy brown cloud of gaseous debris, spread and thinned throughout their corner of Lylat.

Dim blue lights flickered on the bridge. In his seat, Fox accessed systems on his console. After a few pokes he rubbed burn marks and soot off the controls with the cuff of his jacket. ROB helped Rayet up on the other side of his console, and others pulled themselves up from the floor. Sparks hissed from torn cables dangling from the ceiling. Fox had no luck with his console and trudged across the dark debris filled bridge to Krystal who was pulling herself up by her seat. "Krystal." He helped her up. "Is everyone okay?"

"I'm alright," she said shaky. "Just a little bruised up. She straightened her frilly dirty skirt which was torn at the bottom.

Fox held her. "We're here, but I don't know how."

The prince pushed himself up from the debris under his hands and sat on his knees, slapping his paws together, brushing his fur off. He looked down and found a sparkling gem under pieces of metal, wire and glass, the bell necklace with its broken chain. He held it up and studied it in the flickering light. It was still opulent, clean, perfect. He looked back at Krystal and held it up to her. "I'm sorry about your necklace. It was necessary."

Krystal pulled herself out of Fox's arms and took it carefully in her hand, letting the chain run over her fingers. It felt hot. "No, it's alright. It was this…" She thumbed it, turning it over, studying how the gems on the tiny bell sparkled and refracted what little light there was. "It was this that saved us. Just a tiny necklace. A tiny bell."

"A Titanian bell," the prince said proudly.

"I guess we should be thankful." Falco brushed his seat off and sat down, checking his only console that wasn't burnt out.

Rayet rubbed his neck, sitting in the seat next to ROB. "Corneria," he said, cold. He strained his eyes at the bridge window, another swarm of rocks floating by. "It's gone isn't it. This really happened."

Fox held Krystal as tightly as she held the bell in her hand. "It is," he said. "But we're alive. We have to focus on that."

The prince stood, watching the window and the rocks, "Corneria is still there."

"I wish I could believe you," Croy said back in his seat. "But the lovely view says otherwise."

The prince held his hands up ready to explain, "It's complicated but, time is… not what you think it is. At least not to me."

"We're listening," Krystal said.

"Alright." The prince carefully stepped over a bulkhead. "You see time as a line. Hence the word timeline. In your view, things go from point A to point B. Corneria is in point A. We're in point B. Corneria isn't in point B. But that's only half correct. Time is really a sphere, shaped like the universe, expanding outward infinitely. We can travel in any direction in time, backwards, forwards, upwards, downwards."

Falco wasn't buying it. "I get forward and backwards, but how can you travel through time up and down. That makes no sense."

"It's simple," the prince said. "Right now the time is 11:35 p.m. according to your clock system. The day is 15 AAC4 according to your calendar system. Well if I travel up in time, the day would still be 15 AAC4 and the time still 11:35 p.m. but events, persons, objects, quantum states would be different." He pointed at Croy. "Croy might not be here in an upward or downward point in time because in one of those points he got in a car accident on his way to the band's rock show, causing him never to be apart of our string of events."

Croy blinked. "So you're saying, in some other universe, I died?"

"Yes, but you yourself are largely irrelevant."

"Thanks."

The prince took a breath. "What I mean to say is, judging from the circumstances there are likely several billion, trillion universes, time strings, where we all died. It was quite a small window we squeezed through. To tell you what I'm feeling, it's a strong sense of isolation but freshness. I believe this might be the only time string where we survived. It's very unnerving for me to feel. But I can already feel new strings branching off from us, from this point forward."

Rayet scratched his head. "This is some of the craziest crap I've ever heard. I'm still not getting any of this."

Krystal said, "But what about causality and paradox? With time travel, you have those problems. If I go back in time and kill my father, I wouldn't exist here now. So how would I go back in time to-"

Rayet stared, "Why would you want to kill your father?"

She rolled her eyes. "It's just an example ferret boy."

The prince corrected, "No, paradox doesn't exist. You would still exist if you went back in time and killed your father, because if you went back in time, you would be moving across universes and killing your father in a separate universe. You wouldn't just be going backwards in time, but up and down as well."

Fox looked elsewhere with understanding. "In that case, there must be states, time strings, where right now at 11:35 p.m., 15 AAC4, Corneria still exists."

"Precisely," the prince picked up. "Unfortunately, very few. To tell you the truth, I can barely sense them at all, but there are some there. We can still be apart of one of those universes."

"Alright," Krystal said. "How? How do we do it?"

The prince looked at her gravely, "We stop Arc Ycrio. Restore every time string he's affected."

Fox took that and walked with it to his captain's chair. "Alright, that's what we'll do if that's what we need to do to save Corneria. ROB give me a full systems status. Krystal can you get armor tolerance up?"

She checked, "No, I've got power drains. It's at the best it'll get. I can't even get particle diffusers online."

ROB's eyes flickered, "Main engine core is offline. Main engines are offline. Power levels are at 26 percent. Particle diffusers are offline. Armor stabilizers are at 35 percent. Hull damage at rear aft, third port, fifth juncture starboard, C deck, D deck, and E deck. Breech shields are containing the ruptures."

ROB paused and Fox threw his hands up in dismay.

ROB continued, "Long range scanners are offline-"

"Oh there's more," Croy said.

"-Short range scanners are at 40 efficiency. Auxiliary engines are online. Maneuvering thrusters are operational." ROB pulled his jack out of the burned console.

Krystal sighed, "At least it had a happy ending."

Fox pointed, "Falco use the auxiliary engines and thrusters to get us out of this debris field. You're gonna have to get creative." He looked at Prince Orbion, "You're in charge here buddy, lead the way." He gestured toward the window.

The prince froze up, unsure with sudden added responsibility. "We need to get to the planet of Aquas."

"At this time of year, Aquas is on the other side of the system," Falco said. "With just auxiliary engines, it would take days to get there."

"Time of year is unimportant," the prince said.

"You keep saying stuff like that!" Falco complained.

"I'm sorry," the prince said. He looked at Fox. "I wasn't finished. We need to get to Aquas, but Aquas one billion, two million four-hundred eighteen thousand six hundred and thirty-five years ago."

Fox nodded and smirked and rested his elbow on his console, then his chin on his palm. He opened his muzzle halfway, thinking of something to say, tapping his fingers on his nose, but all that came out was "Okay."

**-.-.-.-.-.-**

Six decks below, in the engine room, the prince stood with Fox, ROB, and Krystal in front of the main core, a metal sphere taking up half the room. It was inert, offline. They all stared at the core. The prince reached toward Krystal. "I'm afraid I'll need your necklace again."

She had tied the clasp around her wrist, looping it twice like a loose bracelet. When she felt for it, she was surprised it was still warm. "Alright, here." She undid it and handed it to him.

ROB looked upward. "We're ready down here Falco," came his monotone voice through the bridge communicator. "Keep our trajectory straight."

"Yes," the prince echoed. "As straight as possible."

Falco was at the helm, tapping controls. "Gotcha. Heading 108 mark 5. Current speed, 3,000 k.p.h."

Croy was lounged sideways in the captain's chair with his back against one armrest and his legs over the other. "And we're ready up here guys. What do you say we do some time traveling." Rayet looked at Croy and laughed. Then slinked over and hopped into his lap making him 'oof.'

Falco looked back, "Guys c'mon. Rayet I need you at operations."

Back at the engine core, Fox looked at the prince and shrugged, "Sounds like we're good to go. I guess do your thing."

The prince took a breath, holding the bell, and started toward the engine core. "This would be much easier if I had my glapherim," he mumbled.

He held the bell up toward the core and closed his eyes, but stopped and looked back. "You might want to step back some. This could get very bright and noisy, and possibly dangerous."

Krystal stepped back first and they all followed her, stepping backwards until they were at the lift doors.

The prince made sure they were as far as possible, then closed his eyes again, holding the bell up higher.

Fox looked up, "Falco, get ready to target space 10 kilometers ahead with a polarized particle beam."

"Got it," the bird said, tapping through controls. "Targeting scanners locked. Beam is charged and ready."

Rayet studied his console, "Power levels still pretty low."

Croy checked the captain's console, "I don't know what any of this means, but it's green so that must mean good."

The prince still held the bell up, but nothing happened. Fox was about to say something when his ears perked up, picking up a low deep hum from all around.

Krystal turned, "Fox maybe-"

He held his hand up, stopping her. "Something's happening." He felt a tingling sensation, starting at his hands, then up his arms. He looked down at them and saw the fur sticking up.

"I feel it too," she said, looking at her arms, turning them over. "It's energy."

A small light flickered from the bell in the prince's hand, a small pulse connected between the core and the bell, twisted and faded away, then rebounded, pulsing back, connecting thicker, brighter with a loud zap.

Fox grabbed Krystal, pulling her behind him, but she pushed around his shoulder trying to watch.

"Oh, this is weird," Rayet said to his console, seeing energy readings fluctuate.

The prince cringed and clenched the bell and pulses of clear light rushed up his body, up his cloak and fur flapping in the energy, up through his arms, out the bell into the engine core. Dozens of beams zapped off his body like lightning, flickering, connecting, discharging in various shapes and strengths. "Aquas," he mumbled. "Take us back. Undo what's been done. Save what's not been won."

The core warmed up, power bars indicating it was coming online. ROB went to an engineering console, checking levels.

"Take us back. Undo what's been done. Save what's not been won."

"What's he saying?" Krystal asked. Their fur stood on end, prickling toward the core.

"I don't know," Fox said squinting as the discharges grew brighter.

"To the king of Aquas, who can save what we've lost. To the king of Aquas, to the past at any cost."

Rings of energy warped off the prince in a kaleidoscope of patterns, into blues, greens, reds, running along the beams of energy connecting to the core. Krystal shielded her eyes. A bubble of colors swelled off the prince and focused to a beam, striking the core. A flood of colored energy rushed through pipes, bulkheads, cables. Consoles blew out in the engine room, sparks showering out. Then a second bubble into a second beam, a larger blast. Then another. Until a final one boomed off the prince, up into the bell, shooting into the core, continuous and blinding, energy roaring throughout the ship.

Rayet's eyes went wide at the readings. "Everyone get down!"

The prince shouted into the colors, "Now Falco!"

Fox and Krystal were unable to look away from the beauty. The prince became a pure colored spectrum of light and energy, and the core was meshed and bathed in it like oils dancing on a bubble.

Consoles and panels on the bridge blew off and sparks of every color zoomed through the air. Rayet held his hands by his ears and couldn't hear himself screaming. Croy relaxed in the captain's chair and laughed. Falco ignored it all and activated the beam and kept their heading straight.

Multicolored energy shot from the turrets of the ship, converging at one point ahead. Space ripped open in an explosion of light. An irregular portal wobbled into existence and the Great Fox lumbered toward it.

The bell floated on its own, out of the prince's hands. "To Aquas," he whispered to it. Colors warping over each other carried it up. Energy rushed off the prince, the bell, the core, flooded the engine room, filled the ship, wrapping over the hull.

"Falco!" Fox bellowed, but he couldn't hear anything but the roar, couldn't see anything but the colors. He couldn't feel himself, nothing but tingling. Krystal looked at him, two blue eyes, calmly. She touched his arm, but her hand passed right through him.

The Great Fox went lucid, clear energy, light and colors, stretching, pulling into the portal. On the bridge they saw nothing but white light. Falco's eyes adjusted, pupils shrinking to a point, beak half open, and he saw a planet on the other side of the bright-ringed portal, another Solar twinkling in the new space ahead. It looked different, whiter. The planet was foreign, smaller than Corneria, but with continents, oceans, and clouds just like it, two large ice caps at the poles, no lights twinkling on the dark night side. Suddenly he could see through his console. He let go and could see through his hands and feathers too, the bulkheads above, the floor below, seeing the stars and the full wobbling ring of the portal ahead, the lush blue world of Aquas through it.

They passed into the portal, a wall of energy shooting through the bridge, through Falco's feathers, over Rayet's fur and Croy's skin. Fox could only look at Krystal, trying to feel her until the beams of energy came through the walls and took them away. The entire ship dipped into the portal and the ring collapsed, pinching down into a single point in space before flickering out in every color, then disappearing completely.

The asteroids flying from Corneria's remains floated by calmly undisturbed.

**-.-.-.-.-.-**

The sand on the beach was pristine white. Fox felt it, warm against the side of his face. He lay on his stomach with his arms and hands stretched out above his head, his muzzle turned toward the crystal blue surf washing on shore.

He sniffed and caught the salty air and clawed sand between his fingers. "Krystal," he mumbled, tasting crunchiness on his lips. Suddenly he jolted upward, looking at the beach wide-eyed. It was real. He sat on his knees and grabbed sand with both hands and held it up, letting it run through his fingers. He looked up at the waves washing ashore and listened to their rumbling. The beach continued for as far as he could see, curving slightly. A cool breeze ran over his fur. Foothills rose from the jungle bordering the beach, rising up to faded blue mountains in the distance.

Puffy white clouds drifted slowly, close to the ocean. Larger towering clouds on the ocean's horizon had dark curtains of rain underneath. High in the sky were clouds like fish scales, and then far above those, wispy feathered clouds unmoving.

Fox twisted around and saw the rest of the group. Krystal, Rayet, and Falco lay in the sand close to each other, picking themselves up, brushing themselves off. Croy was half buried in the distance, in front of the Great Fox which towered over the beach, half in the sand, half in the ocean, waves lapping over its wings on one side.

Fox saw a towering figure walking toward him from the ship. He shielded his eyes from the sun to get a better look. ROB's silhouette cleared up and he could see his face. "Hey," he called, unsure of what to say.

ROB walked up and held out his hand out to Fox, who took it.

"How did we land here?" Fox was pulled up. He brushed himself off and spat sand off his tongue. "How are we outside the ship?"

ROB looked around and studied their environment, calculating a response. "For eight minutes and thirty-five seconds, the Great Fox, and its occupants were in a pure energy state after passing through the spatial rift. My cognitive awareness went offline, but my backup sensors were able to record bits and pieces of what happened. I'm unsure how that was possible, given the altered state I underwent."

Krystal approached, "Fox. What happened? How are we here?" She hugged him.

"ROB was just getting to that," he said. Falco, Rayet, and Croy walked up, burned out and tired. They formed a circle. Rayet latched onto Falco and pushed his face against his body, closing his eyes wanting to sleep.

ROB continued, "There isn't much more to tell. The only thing I can recall from my backup sensors is the Great Fox, in this pure energy state, underwent a gentle descent into this planet's atmosphere and landed there." He pointed back at the ship. "I don't know why we're outside the ship, but I theorize that we, being in this pure energy state as well, descended separately from the ship."

Croy felt his hands and arms, "I know some of you guys are gonna disagree with me, but that was probably the coolest experience ever. Kinda like flying. Kinda like dying."

"Wait." Fox blinked, looking at each of them. "Where's Prince Orbion?"

The rest all looked around. Except for the Great Fox, the beach was clear, clean and pure. A small shelled creature in the distance waddled down wet sand, toward the water.

Krystal sensed the prince. His tired ragged voice called to her.

'Krystal,' his gentle lilt echoed in her mind.

She strained her eyes and hunted the beach for any sign of him.

'Did everyone make it?' he thought weakly.

'Yes,' she thought. 'We're all okay. You did it. But where are you?'

'I'm too weak,' his voice faded away, but she could still sense him. Her eyes followed her feelings, moving up the beach, reaching the point where the jungle met the sand, finding the prince lying against a tree.

"There," she pointed far in the distance.

Fox pushed through the circle, dashing to him, and they all followed quickly. They reached him, relieved to see him. The shade under the edge of the jungle was cool and inviting. They formed a circle around him. The prince glowed, white energy fading off of him.

Fox reached for the prince's neck to check his vital signs but jerked his hand away. They all jumped and Fox grabbed his hand in pain.

"What is it?" Falco asked.

"It burned!" Fox growled, studying his hand, seeing the spots on his digits where the fur was singed.

Krystal closed her eyes and tried to feel, cringing. She opened them. "He's alive, but very weak. He's overexerted himself. Everything he's done in the last three hours, shielding us, transporting us, it's been too much on his body."

Fox nursed his hand. "Will he be alright? What can we do?"

The prince blinked, slowly wakening. Everyone except Fox and Krystal took a step back.

The prince smiled up at them, seeing they were all alive and well. He groaned and shifted slightly in the sand with his head rubbing against the base of the tree. "We made it?" he asked weakly. He flexed his smoking fingers and yawned, blinking.

Fox knelt down with Krystal, and came closer. "Yeah, we're here. We made it."

"Good good," the prince mumbled. "I'm sorry about your ship." He tried to look over at it in the surf, straining. "I'm not good at landings."

"You did what you could," Fox said, glancing at the ship. "Are you going to be okay?"

"Yes. Yes, I'll be okay." He carefully touched one of his gold earrings, unhooking it. It was scalding hot, and he dropped it in the sand. "We need to find Alcushire. It is the capitol of the kingdom here."

"We're not going anywhere," Fox said. "Not until you rest, cool off, and we all get our bearings."

Rayet was still clutched to Falco, "I need to rest too," he said against the bird who rubbed his back. "I did a show tonight. I've been in a planetary explosion. I've been turned into energy and back into whatever I am now. I'm tired."

"I have to agree," Falco said.

Fox looked around at their group. "I guess we could all use a break." He looked at the ship. Waves lapped up halfway against the hangar doors. Fox studied the rest of the beach paradise. "ROB see if you can get the bay doors of the ship open. We'll worry about flooding the cargo area later. For now, I guess we'll all just relax out here."

Croy looked at the surf, taking off his jacket, "Hey can we go swimming?"

Fox shrugged and felt warm in his jacket as well. He started pulling it off, "Yeah, do whatever you want."

Krystal stepped away, "Falco, Rayet, and I will try to find wood to build a fire with."

"Wait," the prince said to Krystal. He dug within his cloak and pulled out a sizzling necklace, the bell on the chain swirled with colors of energy. "Well... I supposed I should let it cool off before giving it back to you."

Krystal nodded in wonder at it, "Hang onto it for me," she said winking. Her and Falco wandered off down the beach and Rayet followed and grumbled.

"Fox," the prince mumbled.

Fox looked down at him and the prince struggled to sit up. "All I know of this place is from the stories and poems my mother used to tell me. We should be cautious about everything. I'm not sure what we're getting into, but I do know a bell is here and that the King of Aquas can help us find it."

Fox nodded, "I understand. We'll worry about all this tomorrow. Right now, just rest."

The prince smiled, "Welcome to Aquas I guess. One billion years ago."

**-.-.-.-.-.-**

Evening fell by the time ROB was able to get the cargo doors open. The waves lapped into the hangar bay of the Great Fox, flooding up against Arwings, the band van, stopping just short of the lift. ROB braved the water and retrieved supplies, but everyone else was comfortable around the campfire on the beach and opted not to go on the ship.

"This place is beautiful," Krystal said looking up at the pink and orange clouds and the deep blue surf in the dusking light. "I can't say if there are any beaches on Corneria quite like this." The wind rustled her bangs and she pulled blue hair out of her face with her pinky. Firelight traced shadows across her features.

Croy sat in the sand with his legs stretched out, sopping wet. "I hope ROB is able to find those towels."

Fox sat with Krystal and poked the fire with a stick. Rayet reclined against Falco and wrote in a journal.

Falco ran his talons through the fur on the ferret's head. "Too bad in our time, all of this is under kilometers of ocean."

The prince sat across the fire from him and held his cloak together in the cooling evening breeze. "I didn't know that. When did that happen? What caused it?"

Falco pondered, scratching his beak. "Hm, I think it had something to do with some war in the ocean. About 50,000 years ago… well 50,000 years ago from present day Corneria, I can't remember what they were called, but some ocean creatures melted the ice caps."

"The Bacoon," Fox picked up. He put the stick down and rested his forearms on his knees. "Giant clams. We encountered one during the war, about 10 years ago. Pretty much an evil scientist named Andross created bio-weapons on different planets in Lylat. On Aquas, he transformed a Bacoon into a bio-weapon, pretty nasty. We had to take care of it."

"How awful," the prince said, looking elsewhere, sensing the future of the planet and understanding. "I wish there were a way we could stop that too, but I guess we should focus on our present priorities."

"And what are our present priorities?" Croy asked, wiggling his toes.

The prince held his hands toward the fire, warming them. "We're here because another Titanian bell is here. Tomorrow we should try to figure out where we are on the planet. Hopefully the Great Fox can do that. And from there, we'll head for the city of Alcushire, the largest city on Aquas and the capitol of the kingdom of the Maloos. The King of Aquas will be able to help us find the bell."

"The Maloos?" Krystal asked.

"From what I know," the prince continued, "The Maloos are the indigenous race here on Aquas at this time. I don't really know much more about them I'm afraid."

"Sounds like fun," Croy said. "I love meeting new people, especially ancient civilizations." He looked toward the ship and saw ROB approaching with bins and supplies draped over his shoulders, on his back, and in his hands. "Alright ROB!" he cheered.

Everyone whistled and cheered. "What'd you bring?" Rayet asked as the robot approached.

ROB dumped everything down into the sand behind their circle, forming a large pile of supplies. "See for yourself." The robot found an opening in the circle and plopped down in the sand, sitting, towering over everyone else.

Falco and Rayet were already digging. Croy searched for a towel, but he was mostly dry already anyway. "Alright," Falco said opening up a bin with a big smile. He pulled out a bottle. "Beer."

Rayet pulled one out too and they clinked their bottles together.

"Oh brother." Krystal smirked.

Fox went for one, "Hey, we just traveled over a billion years. I think that's cause for celebration, wouldn't you say?" Falco handed him two, and he popped the cap off one and handed it to Krystal. She took it and inspected the bottle before sipping from it.

"Beer?" the prince asked. "Is that the same horrid drink the robot at the bar sold me?"

They all laughed and Rayet passed him one. "Yes, now enjoy."

They shared beers, stories, and cooked food over the fire until the pinks and oranges in the sky faded to purples and millions of stars above. Falco convinced ROB to go back to the cargo bay and retrieve their instruments. The group sat in their circle and played songs acoustically. They reminisced over their short journey so far and lamented the loss of Corneria, but Prince Orbion, falling into a drunken stupor, eating from his bowl of noodles and swaying with the music, reassured them valiantly in the firelight they would reclaim what was lost. They cheered to that and clinked bottles together, eventually growing tired and retiring by the fire under the stars, the sound of the surf washing ashore soothing them to sleep.

* * *

1,002,418,635 years ago. Paradise discovered. History recovered. Adventure pressing forward. 


	4. Intifada Terra

Thank you for reading and your very kind reviews. Grungy Bird: Prince Orbion is very much a conflicted character. About his mission, about his purpose, and about his life. His view of the universe is one of cascading possibilities and diminishing chance. Confident when the strings look good. Terrified when they wither away.

The story continues...

* * *

**IV**

Dawn light caught the tops of foothills in the distance and raced down the treetops, reaching the beach, sweeping down the sand, over the blankets and sleeping animals. Light hit the top of the Great Fox, down the hull into the ocean, dancing on waves to the horizon in an explosion of light. The morning was noisy, the rush of the surf, the breeze roaring off the water.

Krystal blinked awake and curled against Fox in the sandwich of blankets. She found the nook under his arm where it was hot and sighed on his chest, squinting at the shimmers on the silhouette waves.

Across the dead campfire, Falco wrapped his arm around a sleeping ferret under blankets and rested his beak on his small neck, watching the ocean like Krystal.

The prince slumbered under his own mound of blankets. Croy was awake in the distance. He threw a rock as hard as he could at the ocean, a tiny splash in the distance that disappeared under a curling wave. He saw a crab walking on the sand and picked it up. He studied it shortly then threw it at the ocean like a rock.

Fox shifted and mindlessly rubbed Krystal's back, then looked at her, then the water. She saw him wake and smiled at him. "Morning."

"Morning."

She curled more. "If it weren't for circumstance, this would feel like a vacation."

He smirked and tightened his hold. "Sure, we'll stay here."

Falco was listening and fiddled with one of Rayet's stubby little ears and then pinned his beak over his blanket looking at Fox and Krystal. He ruffled sand out of the feathers on his neck. "Speak for yourselves. Too windy. Too sandy."

Rayet pushed his back against Falco and studied the cloudless sky. A few stars twinkled. "How can we forget Corneria when it's right there," he said groggy and nodded to a bright blue dot far above the rising sun."

They all tilted their heads to look. "Oh yeah," Fox said. "How bout that."

"Nice to see it's there," Krystal said.

"I wonder what it's like now," Rayet said. "Everything different. Probably covered with giant beasts and untouched jungles."

"Maybe we'll stop by." Fox smirked at the ferret. "What's Croy doing?" He saw the pig in the distance in front of the Great Fox. He lobbed something toward them and Fox followed it with his eyes. The clump broke apart in the air and sand rained down on them.

They growled and flapped sand off their blankets and themselves. Another clump came down and hit the pile of blankets the prince was under. The pile jolted in response and the prince's muzzle peeked out from underneath. "What is going on?" he groaned.

"Croy," Falco said. "Sand terrorista." He picked up a clump of his own and threw it blindly over his head.

Rayet grumbled, "You're getting sand everywhere too."

ROB was coming down the beach, behind Croy. "Good morning," he said to the pig.

"Oh hey ROB," Croy said ducking to scoop up more sand. A clump hit the robot in the face.

ROB's eyes shimmered red, either annoyed or mischievous at the slumbering crowd ahead. One of his legs reeled back, kicked, and a wall of sand showered down on the group. They all growled again.

"I meant to hit Croy!" Falco yelled, rubbing sand out of his eyes.

"Collateral damage then," ROB said approaching.

Fox shifted up to rest on his elbows. "What've you been up to?"

The robot stopped in front of the embering campfire. "While you slept I scouted the region within 5 square kilometers."

"Awesome, find anything interesting?"

"There is a small village 3 kilometers to the north." They looked at the jungle bordering the beach. "It appears to be inhabited by a hybrid avian pre-industrial culture."

"Avian?" Falco asked, fully awake and curious.

"The Maloos," the prince said. "They are the people I was talking about. They could tell us how to get to Alcushire."

"I didn't communicate with them," ROB said. "I monitored for 15 minutes before continuing my survey. Nearly everyone was asleep, but I estimate from the number of structures that the village has approximately 50 inhabitants."

Fox nodded. "That'll be our first stop when we get going. How's the Great Fox holding up?"

ROB looked at the ship. "Main power is still offline."

"Great, no electric showers then." Krystal rubbed the side of her face then studied the sand under her fingernails. "Find a replacement to that?"

The robot pointed at the foothills. "There are hot springs a five minute walk from here." They all twisted around to look in that direction.

Krystal bit her lip and looked at Fox smirking, "Just your idea right?"

Croy approached, "Truce guys. Everyone up? What's the plan for today?"

"No more sand." Rayet squirmed, pulling a blanket tight against him and pushing back into Falco. "Either sleep more or breakfast."

They settled on breakfast and shuffled awake, starting the fire up again. They cooked a bountiful pot of noodles and after eating, ROB led the way to the hot springs carrying bags of supplies, the sun fully up in the sky.

They reached where the beach met the jungle and looked inside the dark lush woodland with apprehension. ROB was already twisting his way in, shoving trees and brush aside making a path for them.

"Are we safe in there?" Rayet asked.

"We should be," the prince said, but not moving.

Fox patted the ferret on the head, "ROB, any giant beasts to worry about?"

"None," the robot said further in the jungle.

Krystal was already following. "Don't be a bunch of babies," she said cattily to the group of males.

The prince blinked and the rest followed into the dark jungle. Croy shook his head. "I hate when women do that to us."

The terrain rose, and ROB shoved apart trees and continue climbing the incline at the same speed barreling through. The group struggled to follow, falling onto their hands and knees, pulling themselves up the dirt and broken branches. Fox helped Krystal, taking her hand and pulling her up. Beams of sunlight snuck in through the hazy pollen filled air.

Croy grumbled and huffed. "I don't have. To say anything. This time."

"Are we there yet?" Rayet cried. Falco pulled him up a steep point and the ferret brushed his shirt off, continuing on. "I was born in the city, raised in the city, never left the city. And this is why."

ROB reached the crest and stood, surveying. They caught up to him and stood on the edge of the ridge, taking in the vista. Lush jungles and hills, rivers, and mountains spread to the horizon. The ridge was actually the edge of a sloped caldera with a small pond nestled in several meters down.

A waterfall emptied into the sparkling spring and mist and steam mixed over the water, refracting a rainbow in the mid-morning light. The jungle hugged the jagged rim and smooth grey platforms of rock jutted out over the water. The mossy rocks glistened with dew.

Fox rubbed his forehead. "ROB you didn't say it was a paradise."

"It feels like home." Krystal tugged on the towel around her neck and sighed.

Croy carefully stepped down a part of the ridge with rocks like stair steps. They tapered perfectly into the spring. He touched the water with his toe, then put his whole foot in. "Ooh," he cooed from below. "Guys, this feels good!"

Fox, Falco, Prince Orbion, and Rayet started down the steps as well.

ROB gestured to a higher ridge bordering the caldera. "There are also two more springs over there."

Krystal jumped and took ROB by his hand. "Oh good! I'll go to one over there, and you guys can have this one."

Fox stopped halfway down the steps and was ready to climb back up. "Can I uh, join you?" He made his voice carry over the rim.

She disappeared out of view with ROB and started unbuttoning her blouse. "Absolutely not!" she called.

Falco took Rayet by the arm back up the steps, both laughing. "We're gonna take the third one," Falco said.

Croy melted into the springs up to his shoulders sighing at Fox. "Reeejected."

Fox narrowed his eyes at the simmering pig. "You would know all about rejection wouldn't you." He took his clothes off and stepped into the spring, checking the temperature first, not trusting Croy's tolerance. He stepped down further, drifting in until the water came up to his neck. He put his back to the rocks on the other side, resting his arms up and tilting his head back.

The prince put his cloak, billowy purple pants and jewelry in a pile and set the necklace with the Titanian bell very gently on top, like a small altar. Once he was pleased, he got in the water as well.

There was silence except for the rumble of the waterfall and water dripping off the underside of rocks. Croy had a multitude of tattoos of bones and script names and colorful designs on his shoulders and chest and the prince studied them curiously, never seeing a species with skin that would allow that, but he thought against asking about it.

After a moment Croy said, "Prince Orbion of Titania," emphasizing each syllable of importance.

The prince rubbed the white fur on his chest absently. "Yes?"

"Is Orbion your only name? You don't have like a first name or a nickname or anything? I like Falco's nickname for you, what was it, Orb? I might use that, it's catchy."

"Lito."

"What?"

"That's my first name. Lito."

Fox lifted his head from the rocks behind him, looking at the skinny red fox with disbelief. "You've had a first name this whole time and you never told us."

The prince shifted in the steamy water. "We were in a rush from the start. I thought my title was sufficient."

"Well I guess, but we can't just call you Prince Orbion forever."

"Lito," Croy said. "I like that too. It's short."

"Thanks."

"So," Croy rested his arms like Fox and patted the rocks. "Prince Lito Orbion of Titania. So you have a lot of money and stuff?"

Fox rested his head again and looked up at the sky. "Croy, c'mon. Give him a break."

The pig laughed, "What! I'm just looking for people who might want to contribute to the band's demo fund. Do you know how much it costs to rent a recording studio these days?"

The other spring was much smaller and Krystal was alone with ROB, both submerged up their necks.

"I don't know ROB, sometimes I just wonder." She sponged her neck and sighed in the steam. "I don't think it's working."

"To what are you referring."

"This relationship, with Fox." She put the sponge down on a rock behind her, and rubbed the fur on her neck back and forth with both hands. "Sometimes I just don't feel it with him."

ROB was perplexed. "Describe the feeling and I will try to assess it."

Krystal laughed. "Don't worry about it ROB. This isn't really a puzzle. Sometimes you can't calculate feelings."

"I can hypothesize."

Krystal shook her head, "Sometimes you can't hypothesize from them either. They're just there."

"Then what is it that troubles you about Fox?"

She looked at him and stopped rubbing her neck, just holding, thinking. "I'm not sure. I feel like it's all-" She searched for a word. "Forced. Like we're supposed to like each other because it's convenient, because we've simply been around each other out of circumstance. That's how I feel like this relationship started."

ROB stayed silent, the trillions of processes in his brain trying to compute female reasoning and failing miserably, a rarity for him.

"It's just the little things too. Like the way he always holds me, tries to protect me at every small bump in the road."

"I have observed Fox embrace you in moments of crisis six times in the past 12 hours."

Krystal grew defensive to no one. "I mean, he doesn't have to. I can defend myself. I fly my own Arwing too and call my own shots."

"Of course," ROB agreed, losing track of Krystal's conversational direction even more.

She shook her head and picked up the sponge again wetting it. "I'm not making any sense am I?"

"Logically, I can't determine."

"You're right. It isn't important. Not now at least." She sighed. "I keep forgetting we're on a mission here. Probably the biggest mission of our lives."

Back at the other spring, Fox and Croy were getting out and toweling themselves dry, except the prince who was dressed and already up the stone stairs. He wandered around the rim of the caldera, looking down at the spring and avoiding Krystal's, shy at the thought of her. He saw the rim of the third caldera and pushed through bushes to reach it. A breeze rushed over the hilltops and rustled the trees in the high morning sun. The prince pulled his damp red hair back and looked down into the third hot spring.

He saw Falco and Rayet standing close, facing each other. Water came up to Rayet's chest and Falco's waist. The prince was going to call to them and say they were ready to go, but he stopped, feeling odd at the sight. Rayet clutched the feathers on Falco's chest and they pressed together. The ferret looked up and the bird looked down and their faces touched.

The prince covered his mouth, hoping the wind caught any gasp he might have made. He shut his eyes and scurried back into the bushes, blindly, nearly tripping and getting whacked in the face by small branches. He quickly stopped and stood up straight, and knew he must have seen wrong. He crawled to the edge of the caldera again, peeking in.

Their faces were still touching and Falco ran his fingers across Rayet's cheek and pulled both his arms around him, holding him close. The prince was perplexed and speechless. He scrambled back to his feet, and disappeared in the bushes again, now sure of what he'd seen.

Croy and Fox were dressed and up the stone steps. The pig snapped Fox with a towel.

"Hey! Watch it!" Fox grabbed his towel off the rocks and was about to return the favor until the prince dashed up panting. "Woah, what's up?"

The prince caught his breath. "The most bizarre thing. In the other spring. Falco and Rayet. It was odd. I don't know what to say about it."

Croy and Fox looked at each other. Croy grinned. Fox scratched his temple. "Er… what exactly did you see?"

The prince fumbled with words. "Well, I was watching. They were. Falco was touching Rayet and holding him like he was a woman!"

Croy tried with all his effort not to burst out laughing, half walking away, snorting out his nose.

"Well," Fox started carefully. "That's what two people in love do."

The prince couldn't think and froze, but realization slowly melted over his expression of confused horror.

Fox sighed and started folding his towel. "I don't know what things were like three hundred million years ago on Titania, but in our time on Corneria, that's pretty normal."

The prince eyed Fox suspiciously and unsure. "Oh I see. Well. Have you? Loved someone who was also…?"

Croy grabbed his mouth and laughed into his hands, squinting at Fox almost in tears.

Fox groaned at the pig. "No. I like women. Krystal is my girlfriend."

Croy tittered through his fingers. "You like mennnn."

Krystal walked up, dressed in clean camo-pants and a black shirt, much better suited for outdoor adventure than the dressy skirt and blouse from before. She rubbed her ear with a towel. "What's going on? What's wrong with Croy?"

"It's complicated," Fox said. "The prince saw Falco and Rayet."

Krystal tilted her head and rubbed her other ear. "Yeah?" A moment of rubbing and silence and realization kicked in for her too. "Oh that." She looked at the prince, sensing his state of confusion.

The prince shook it off, looked elsewhere and forced a smile. "I was told I'd encounter technologies and new ideas so bizarre and alien, but I guess I can't be prepared for everything."

Rayet climbed over a bush in the distance and Falco followed. They approached and everyone turned, staring at them. "I can't believe you're wearing our band shirt," Rayet said. "You can't wear a band shirt if you're in the band. That's so vain-" He looked up and saw everyone staring. "Okay."

Falco plucked a leaf off his 'Space Death' shirt and let it go in the wind, approaching blindly. "I don't see the big deal. I'm getting the name out." He bumped into Rayet and looked up at the silence. "Why does it feel like everyone was just talking about us?"

Everyone jumped into movement, looking elsewhere, folding towels, unzipping bags. "What?" Croy asked, the corners of his mouth twitching trying not to smile. "No we were just getting ready to head out. Yeah the springs were nice."

Fox zipped a bag and put his arm around Krystal, "Yup. We're going to that village now." Krystal slinked out of his arm.

"Guys, seriously," Falco said.

The prince stepped to the ferret and the tall bird. "I saw you two kiss. And it was a strange experience for me. And I'm sorry."

Falco blinked and put his arm around the ferret proudly. Rayet rubbed the bridge of his snout, cringing, a little shy. "Cool."

Krystal sighed at the awkwardness and put her hands together, "Okay. There. Everything's settled. Yay."

Something whooshed over their heads and an arrow impaled ROB's neck. No one noticed.

"Did you hear that?" Fox asked, looking ahead at the jungle, the source of the sound.

Falco grumbled, "Oh your damn big ears always hear something."

ROB tried to say something but only garbled electric sounds came out.

Krystal looked at the robot and screamed and covered her mouth, still screaming through her fingers. Everyone twisted around and saw.

The robot twitched and fumbled for the arrow. "I think I'm damaged." He pulled it out from the back of his neck and looked at it. He dropped it, looked up, and fell over, crashing into the rocks.

"Everyone down!" Fox grabbed the prince by the shoulder and pushed him down and crawled for his bag with his gun. He pulled it out and held it up by his head. His eyes darted over the jungle surrounding them. They were vulnerable, pushed up against the rim of the caldera. Falco pulled Rayet to the ground and covered the ferret's head, inspecting the woods like Fox. Croy and Krystal crawled to ROB and tended to him, checking the damage.

Fox saw a face in the woods, two eyes, a red beak, but it disappeared behind a tree. "Hey!" he shouted. "Hey! Show yourselves!"

Another appeared, and this one was brave, a tall white-feathered bird with a red beak as well. He came proudly out of the woods wearing only a cloth and painted rope jewelry around his shins, wrists, and neck. He held a bow unguarded at his side with his chest puffed out, looking at each of them with stern blue eyes. He towered over them as he approached.

Falco's eyes tensed at the sight of another avian, and Fox held his gun protectively. The prince studied the bird carefully and noticed his red beak was painted, traces of yellow underneath.

"Alright," Fox said calmer, not letting go of his gun. "Now I have to ask why you shot at us."

Two smaller birds came out of the woods, with the same brown cloths and rope rings and holding bows at their sides. One had bright green feathers and an orange beak, while the other was white like the biggest and had the most painted rope rings stacked up his left forearm.

"This must be them, the Maloos," the prince said uneasy and unsure.

"I thought they were supposed to help us," Rayet said under Falco's protective wing.

The giant bird boomed gibberish at them, rapidly talking in his language, gesturing to ROB. He kept talking and talking and Fox wavered, crouching uneasily with his gun still held, looking between each bird. He lightly shook his head. "I don't. I don't understand you."

The towering white bird grimaced and marched toward Fox and everyone seized up from the sudden approach. Fox pointed his gun at the bird, but he smacked it away. The weapon clinked down the stone steps and plopped into the hot spring. Fox looked at the bubbling water, but the bird grabbed his head by both sides. Fox grabbed at feathers and the colorful ropes on his arms, trying to pull him off.

Krystal shouted something and Falco moved to shove the bird, but another grabbed him from behind. The green-feathered bird held Rayet who squirmed and cried out.

"Now do you understand!" the bird boomed at Fox, speaking perfectly. Fox blinked, calm, his head still in the bird's vice grip.

"Yeah," Fox muffled. "I gotcha."

"They're telepaths," Krystal said, still edgy. The bird let go of Fox.

Croy was studying ROB's neck where circuits and wires were severed around the frayed hole. ROB was conscious but immobile and Croy kept reaching to touch but pulled away not wanting to inflict more damage. The robots eyes shimmered at the clouds above. "This looks really bad guys," the pig said. "Can they answer why they shot him?"

The largest bird pointed his bow at the robot's sprawled body. "This mountain demon will no longer harm anyone."

"Mountain demon?!" Fox shouted incredulous. "That was my damn robot!"

The birds looked at each other, not understanding. Falco shoved his way out of a bird's grip and went to ROB.

"A robot!" Fox shouted again, hoping for realization. "He's a person! He's our friend!"

The green-feathered bird replaced his bow in his sack. "Your 'row-bot' was seen in the night, stalking our village, watching our dwellings from the trees. The guardsmen saw his evil red eye glow with desire. We were sent to hunt him down."

The prince stood up and the warrior birds took notice of him, inspecting him curiously. "Excuse me," he said. "As you can tell, I am telepathic as well. I'm Prince Lito Orbion of Titania and I-"

"An Anua!" the biggest one yelled, recognizing the jewelry, his cloak, the royal purple.

The prince smiled. "Yes! Yes that's right! I'm prince of the Anuas on Titania, 700 million years from now. You know us?"

The bird backhanded the prince and he flew into the bushes, out cold. The other two birds, drew arrows taut, aiming at Falco and Fox since they were the first to try and attack the beastly bird.

"Why did you do that?!" Krystal yelled, turning and holding her arms and hands out between Falco, Fox, and the birds, trying to cool the situation.

The bird cawed, a deafening screech and dozens of green and white-feathered birds sifted out of the jungle with arrows taut and spears and other strange primitive weapons held over their shoulders, all with rope and shelled jewelry, surrounding them.

The group froze and looked around at the encroaching avian hunters. "We're in trouble," Croy said, getting up from ROB.

The large bird puffed his chest out. "The Anuas are allies with the Maloos, our sworn enemies. They provide them weapons and obscene magic from their time to help in our eradication from the hills and shores of our lands."

"Ah shit," Rayet grumbled, rubbing his head.

"Of all the places we had to crash land," Falco said. "It had to be in rebel intifada territory." He looked at Fox as other birds came around them and started binding their hands with blue and red painted rope. "Well. What do we do captain?"

Fox was at a loss, just angrily huffing to himself, feeling the rope around his wrists grow tighter and tighter.

Falco shrugged and looked at the unconscious prince slumped in the bushes. "How bout you Orb? Orby? Any ideas? Nope? No magic spells to wake you up? Or teleport us? Or I don't know, find these damn bells that we're looking for?"

Krystal rolled her eyes. "Falco. That's not helping."

Falco looked between the two larger birds who started binding his wrists together. "Hey guys. Check it out. I have feathers and a beak. You have feathers and a beak. That makes us like family." The birds stopped, unsure, checking the large white-feathered bird.

"Do not listen to him," said the colossal bird. "He might have feathers and a beak but he is not one of us."

They nodded and continued binding and Croy looked at Falco. "Nice try."

"Eh, it was worth a shot."

Rayet was not pleased with his restraints and shifted and grimaced. "If you're not Maloos, then who are you people?"

The massive bird pinched the little ferret by the chin and burrowed down with his electric blue eyes. "We're the Yit and there are thousands of us in these hills."

Images rushed into Rayet's mind, villages and tree-houses, armies fighting over hilly grasslands and flying arrows, spears, flocks in the sky, painting ceremonies, avian women carrying baskets on their heads. He went into a daze in the bird's grip, understanding everything, the entire history. His head tingled from the flood of knowledge. Falco struggled, concerned at Rayet's sudden serene state.

"In the coming months, the Maloos will be very sorry they ever tried to take these lands. And you will be sorry you ever helped them." He let go of the ferret and picked up the prince, hoisting him over his shoulder like a hunted animal. The birds started to shuffle them away, taking their supplies with them as well. Several tied up ROB and hoisted him on a wood altar with handles to carry.

"But we're not helping them!" Fox yelled, but they had already formed a caravan, taking them down the grassy windswept hill on the other side of the hot springs.

"Look," Krystal started to the domineering white bird who she assumed by this point was their leader. The bird looked at Krystal angrily as they marched. She had an itch on her nose and struggled with her hands. "We don't know what's going on between your people and these Maloos and the Anuas. We've never even seen the Maloos. We're sort of new to this neighborhood, but we're on a quest that has nothing to do with your conflict. We just traveled a billion years into the past to get here to find-"

"Quiet!" the bird barked. "You speak too much. A symptom of a simple mind only able to think aloud."

Croy snickered and Krystal glared at him. "This isn't funny Croy. Is everything a joke to you?"

"Time travel!" the giant bird huffed. "Obscene. The Anuas play with time like it's their toy. They tie and cut strings to fit their way while others suffer at their expense. You are only an accomplice to this little creature's poison." He held the prince's feet together to keep them from dangling.

Fox tried to look back at him but another bird shoved him forward. "Whether or not you're enemies with the Maloos or the Anuas or whoever, there is a greater threat here. The future of Aquas and this entire system depends on our success. You have to let us get to Alcushire."

The albatross pushed forward and grabbed the back of Fox's head, covering his entire skull. "Quiet."

Fox felt everything scramble, hearing a fuzzy roar in his head, then a high pitched whine. He tensed up, shoulders rising, and cried out softly. His muscles went rigid, but it wasn't painful. Then it all went dead, consciousness slipped away and he slumped in the hands of two other birds, who continued onward, dragging him. The bird let go and sneered back at Falco, Krystal, Rayet and Croy. "Anyone else wish to speak?"

Croy raised his bound hands up. "Uh I'm kind of tired of walking. Could I get that?" He nodded to Fox. "Whatever it was you did to him there."

The bird inspected the pig, cringing at his irritating voice, but decided against it, not wanting to have to drag him as well. They carried on and Croy sulked at being ignored.

**

* * *

**Intifada historama amidst the fauna drama. But where's the bell and where's the King? Even though Lito's unconscious, a l**o**t is happening. 

He eyed the st**r**ings in his mind. Mother and King with the **b**ell to find.

Why it isn't **i**n Alcushire. It's with these birds who have **o**ur ire. Take and acquire, before time can retire. If you wait any lo**n**ger, then all will expire!

The prince nodded to his **m**other and the ghostly porpoise King of Aquas. They dissolved in the rush of consciousness, strings and light fading into white feathers.

The prince blinked awake, hanging over the broad shoulder of the white-feathered leader of the avian warriors. A strong grip held his ankles together. His muzzle and o**u**tstretched hands bounced against the feathers on the leader's back from each massive stride. Blood rushed to his head and he stared at the large yellow talons digging into the dirt and lifting, striding, **s**tepping, digging, lifting, striding, stepping, digging.

A little gold bracele**t** dangled on the ankle.

And on the bracelet was a little bell, sparkling in the sporadic jungle light.

The prince smiled.

"This is a **s**hortcut," his mother's voice spoke ethere**a**l in the distance. "One of few I can spare.

Take the bell to the King who's growing aware, of his planet's **c**oming war and eventual despair.

His powe**r** is unimaginable and he holds your fate. Ask n**i**cely and he'll send you to a **f**ar distant date.

Back to Corneria to f**i**nd the ancestor of McCloud. She holds the third bell with which she's endowed, but for your safety, the details I must enshroud. You **c**annot dwell on these words, not even aloud.

For Arc Ycrio is list**e**ning.

**-.-.-.-.-.-**

On the pristine beach with white sand, the evening sun was setting on the hills again.

A black dragon with glistening obsidian scales stood alone. The wide shadows of his leathery relaxed wings stretched across the sand in the low orange light.

He leaned carefully toward the hull of the Great Fox beached in the low tide and tapped it with his knuckles, knocking gently. His anchoring tail swished, sweeping dunes. Something's out of place, something's amiss. Why in this time is there a ship like this? His scaly nostrils sniffed and he smiled, glancing down at the swarm of footsteps, tracing them to a burnt wood pile, and then up the beach to the jungle.

He sensed two bells and a prince and blinked aghast, powers still drained, but regaining fast, enough to bring him here, this far in the past.

The trail was now hot.


	5. Yit Immortality

**V**

The team awoke in a much more uncomfortable place than the serene beach before. This time when dawn light crept in, they awoke on a hard reed floor instead of forgiving white sand. Their prison was a one room mud hut with walls of vine and reeds and a roof of what looked like thatch straw and large green leaves. There was an open doorway leading outside, but the feathered shoulders of two large birds curtained the entry.

Fox hardly slept. He pulled himself off the reeds and twisted his body, vertebrae popping satisfactorily. He pulled his tail around and popped some of the bones in that, a nasty habit Krystal loathed. She stirred next to him and grumbled awake at the unnerving sound.

She glared up at him, ears folded down disapproving, his body silhouetted in the bright morning light coming through the mud hole of a window.

"Sorry," Fox said. "It's the floor."

Prince Orbion sat in a corner with his knees tucked under his arms, waiting. "Now that you're up, I actually have good news to volunteer."

Falco lay against the wall on the other side next to Croy, who snored. He watched the ceiling and clasped his hands over his chest. "Good news? You mean news that counters the fact we're prisoners in some backwards cuckoo bird village a billion years in the past?"

"Yes," the prince said.

Falco grinned at the ceiling. "Oh good. Please almighty Prince Lito Orbion, tell us your good tidings."

The prince sighed. "I'm learning modern sarcasm quite well."

Fox waved off Falco, "Ignore him, we're listening."

The prince continued, "The good news is, we're right where we need to be. The second bell is here. In this Yit village."

Krystal pushed herself off her hands and sat up, "How is that possible? I thought it was in that place called Alcushire."

"The King of Aquas is a powerful clairvoyant. With my mother's help they were able to change some strings to move the bell here instead."

Falco still grinned but blinked furiously, "Your mother. Your mother and the dandy King of Aquas were able to _move_ the bell here to this village?"

"Yes. That's correct," the prince said unsure of Falco's tone.

Falco lost it, snapping upward to glare at the prince. "Why the hell didn't she just put it on the beach?! On a nice little platter, waiting for us! We could have gotten it then and gotten the hell out of here and not had to deal with any of this!"

One of the guards peeked his beak in the doorway, watching their argument suspiciously.

The prince sighed exasperated and sat up cross-legged. "It's not that simple! You have no concept of what's occurring when something like this happens. Entire universes are shifted, lines cut, re-arranged. I can't even begin to explain the amount of power needed to do something like that." He shook his head flustered. "Clearly they did this because they saw something in our immediate future before the change, something bad that we had to avoid. These things aren't done on a whim. It's extremely unlikely we'll get another shortcut like this."

"Great," Krystal said. "This early in the game and we've already used our freebie."

"Game?" Falco tilted his head to her. "Wow I almost forgot I was having fun here, running through the jungle, getting kidnapped by cuckoo birds, sleeping on bamboo next to sir snore-a-lot." He smacked Croy on the side, who snorted and turned over, still asleep.

"I didn't mean it like that," Krystal said.

"Falco calm down," Fox said.

Falco didn't calm down, he suddenly twisted around, looking at Croy, the rest of the mud hut, each of them. "Rayet. Where's Rayet? Rayet's gone."

Fox and Krystal inspected the hut with Falco.

The prince snapped to attention and his mind searched desperately like everyone's eyes. "The leader," he said calmly. "He's with the leader who took us."

Falco had picked up a tuft of straw and reeds off the floor, as if he might find Rayet underneath. He dropped them and regarded the prince icily. "The leader? The big dumb albatross? Why is he with him? Why does he have him?"

"He took him in the night, but he doesn't seem to be in any sort of distress."

Falco almost laughed. "Well I'm in distress."

Fox stood up, brushing off his knees. "Lito, is there any way you can figure out why he would take Rayet?"

On the other side of the village in the largest mud brick abode two-stories high, the only structure with more than one floor, Rayet slept on a large bed of fabrics and feathers curled in a ball, hardly taking up any space. The imposing leader of the Yit stood at the head of the bed and crossed his arms over his feathered chest and watched the furry creature breathe and sigh slowly in sleep. The ferret stirred and rested his chin on his arm and blinked slowly. His eyes caught the bird, wearing a cloth and painted rope bands on his arms and legs. Rayet jolted fully awake and jerked back and looked for an escape and saw none and pushed himself up against the wall at the back of the bed.

"You do not need to be frightened," the bird said deeply.

"What do you want?" Rayet asked fast. "Why am I here?" Furs and pelts of feathers decorated the walls with spears, bows and arrows. This was a warrior's lair.

The bird paced around the room, looking at his footsteps deep in thought. "There is something important to be done here. Something you might not entirely understand."

"Where's Falco, Fox, Lito, what did you do with my friends?"

"Your friends are safe. They're being held until the elders can judge them."

That didn't satisfy Rayet. "Judge them? What crimes did they commit?"

"The Anua you're with, we are at war with his allies. He was aiding the enemy."

Rayet's eyebrows tensed and he wanted to growl, "The only thing Prince Orbion is aiding is our future."

"Your future," the albatross said tired, but not bitter. His pacing stopped and he rested his talon foot on the bed to stop himself from pacing. A bracelet with a bell dangled at his ankle, but Rayet didn't notice. "I already know what happens." The leader looked elsewhere.

"What do you mean?" Rayet asked.

"The Yit will lose to the Maloos. Our territories will be wiped away under their kingdom. Our culture will be lost."

Rayet shook his head, slowly but sympathetically. "I'm sorry, I don't know what to say. I don't entirely understand what is going on between them and your people, but there are bigger things at stake, you have to believe me."

The albatross came quickly to Rayet's side of the bed, towering over him and moving close to the ferret, bringing his knee up to rest on the bed. Rayet jerked back, terrified at the giant moving close.

"I know what's at stake," the leader said strongly. "There is something. There is one thing left to do."

Rayet shook his head and tried to ignore the bird's muscled chest and torso, breathing under all the white feathers. "What? What is it?"

"The Yit will be lost to time, but you, with the Anua and your friends, will succeed and will return to the future. You will remember our culture. Our existence. And you will share our history with the future. You will teach them about us, the great Yit."

Rayet looked elsewhere, the leader's piercing blue eyes disarming him, "But how, I barely know anything about your people. We just got here."

The albatross grabbed the ferret's head and pressed his forehead to his. Rayet grabbed at the bird's arms, struggling against the warmth and closeness of the imposing albatross. Suddenly he felt something pouring into his mind, tingling down his forehead, down his spine, through his whole body. He jerked and twitched and grabbed at the bed fabrics and feathered arms again and winced, but not quite in pain, something changing, some strong feeling rushing over his whole body. He lost his sense of self. He stood atop a hill overlooking a valley of villages with hundreds of Yit standing around him, watching the same.

More than just images flooded his mind. Tastes, smells, memories, songs, dances, people, faces, beaks, battles, hilltops, feathers, flashed through and through. He saw the leader with a family, a wife, several young chicks. Then the wife was gone, then the kids were old, then the kids were gone. There was no family left, only stones to pray to. The albatross pulled himself off the ferret.

Rayet was stunned and shivered and panted, cold, saddened from knowing so much. The burden of dozens of lives and a foreign culture became as clear as his own.

"Those are just my memories," the leader said. "You will carry them. But the elders must see you. You will carry their memories as well."

Rayet caught his breath. He knew the bird's whole life. His name was Balo. He was decades old, he had a family. He ruled over this village for several years, defending it against skirmish after skirmish of Maloo campaigns, defending it valiantly. He was respected. Sweat glistened on Rayet's brow, and his mind tingled, the same tired feeling after taking an arduous exam, a feeling he hadn't felt since school years ago. He looked up at the blue eyes. "I can't Balo. It's too much."

"You must Rayet. Your mind is of perfect resonance, unlike anyone else. I can feel it when we touch. You are intimate with the avian species. I saw you with him. At the springs. Your mind is joined with our kind."

"Falco," Rayet said softly, shy, looking elsewhere.

"The elders will see you and they will give you the knowledge of our existence. You must carry it."

Rayet was dumbstruck. "But who will listen to me in my future? I'm not important. I'm just a drummer in a band trying to make a living."

The albatross grabbed Rayet again by the arms and the ferret winced, expecting more, but the bird merely lightly shook him, "You will make them listen. You not only know my persuasion, my ability to lead, but you have it now. It is yours. There is no time. The elders are taking your friends as we speak. We must go to them. You will take the elders' memories in exchange for the freedom of your friends."

Rayet studied the bird's intense face. "They will let us go? If I do this?

The albatross rose and stepped away to the window, bringing his large arms and hands up to hold the wall. The sound of birds cawing came over the village and through the window. "It is their decision. There will be those who disagree with my thoughts. There are those who will think the Anua's presence has clouded my vision."

"How could psychics disagree with each other?" Rayet asked. "Shouldn't you see the same things? Isn't the future all the same?"

The albatross rested his brow on his arm and watched as a vast crowd of birds gathered around a bonfire in the village center far outside his window. "Looking at the future is like watching the ocean. There are many waves cresting and breaking, washing ashore. You can only watch a few at once, and only one to truly know it, to know its every detail, the foam, the sound, the personality. Before anyone can see the wave I know, it's already washed ashore, it's already pulling back under the water, it's already disappeared under a new wave." The albatross sighed and looked at Rayet. "I've been watching this wave for years. And now it's finally crashing ashore."

The sound of birds cawing and talking and squawking rose through the window. "Come," Balo said. "They're ready."

In the village center the bonfire burned in the warm morning light. Fox shook off the strong grip of a green albatross. Several armed birds escorted the group. Krystal, Falco, Lito, and Croy stuck close together, herded together like cattle by the imposing birds. Villagers, warriors and commoners alike, watched the group of prisoners with eager and curious eyes.

Krystal leaned to Fox, "So what's the plan," she mumbled.

"The bell is on the leader," the prince mumbled to the both of them. "We have to get it off of him."

"You're freaking kidding me," Falco growled. "Your mom has a real sense of humor."

The prince ignored him.

Croy looked around at the rustic native village, the straw thatched roofs and the large avian women carrying baskets on their heads. "I should have brought my camera. Oh look, there's ROB."

The robot was tied to a tall totem pole with dozens of ropes strapping him securely. His tired red eyes glowed dimly and followed the group like the villagers'.

Fox gritted his teeth at the sight. "We'll figure out a way to get him back in shape. If only Slippy was here."

Falco smirked. "We'll swing by present day Corneria before our next stop and pick him up."

"Falco look," Krystal said pointing past the bonfire.

Balo, seven feet tall, decorated in rope jewelry, cloths and paint, stood on the other side of the fire with Rayet who's cheeks were streaked with blue paint. He was dressed in his normal black shirt and vest and blue cargo pants, but painted rope jewelry adorned his arms."

"What the hell," Falco said in awe.

"Make way for the elders!" A green-feathered bird shouted from a rooftop.

"The elders! The elders!" the villagers squawked.

Croy leaned to the group. "Weird. I don't like this. And why do they have a fire. That makes me nervous. The moment they put an apple in my mouth, I'm getting out of here."

"Shut up Croy," Fox grumbled. "I'm thinking."

"We do need to get out of here," Krystal said.

"It's somewhere on him," the prince said determined. He nodded to Balo. The albatross put his hand on Rayet's shoulder and eyed the approaching group. Falco didn't like that. "He has to have it somewhere."

Fox raised his chin and scanned the monstrous bird. "Maybe it's imbedded in one of those rope arm bands or something."

Croy studied the daunting albatross as well. "Maybe he left it at home?"

"The question is," Krystal started. "If he does have the bell, how do we get it from him?"

Falco nodded to the familiar ferret next to Balo. "Maybe Rayet has the answer."

Villagers parted, forming a clear path for five ancient birds. The elders, all female, of varying shapes, heights and colors, hobbled slowly through the open path the villages made, regarding young children who stood silently and reverently. One elder took a rope bracelet from her forearm and her shaking hands hung it on a child's beak. A mother and father looked at each other elated and kneeled down with their child and bowed their heads.

The group watched the strange gesture with suspicion.

The elders made their way through the clearing and walked past the bonfire, some with walking sticks. Armed warriors helped them up onto a smooth stone altar at the head of the circle. There were five decorated thatch chairs wrapped in painted ropes and leaves. They took their seats, and stomped their sticks, watching over the clearing. Their groups formed a triangle: Rayet and Balo at one point, Fox's group at the other, and the elders' stone altar at the top. The fire burned in the center.

The village fell silent, down to just the wind rustling trees and the fire crackling.

"Bring the Anua," said the wilting green elder sitting in the center chair, barely above a whisper.

Two soldiers grabbed the prince by the arms and dragged him to the stone platform and let him go. He fell on his hands and knees in the dirt beneath the elderly women.

"Young Anua," the green elder continued, her beak an aged yellow. "You have frightened many with your presence in our land and time."

Several villagers squawked in agreement in some strange language.

The prince ignored the elder and the noisy villagers. Instead he turned his head and watched Balo who stared back with intense eyes. Rayet, by his side, looked on at the prince with concern. The prince's eyes wandered down Balo's strong figure, down his legs to his feet where the bell dangled by his ankle. He smiled.

Balo glared at the prince's grin, perplexed. He followed the prince's eyes down to his own feet, to the bracelet. Suddenly he couldn't remember how he got the beautiful gold trinket with the bell. It was foreign. But the Anua knew. The bracelet, the bell, he had no memory of it until the Anua came. Thoughts clicked together in his mind. The bracelet was an evil spectacle of the Anua, an invasion of dark magic. He felt the power on him. Power of the Anuas.

The elder continued above the prince. "You are a danger to the Yit and all we stand for. The Anua give power to the Maloos, who threaten our very existence. We are one of the last remaining villages. We are at our ends."

The prince continued to ignore her and watched Balo lift his leg up. The bird clutched the bracelet, ripping it off his talon with frightened disgust.

Fox watched the inattentive prince. "What is he looking at?" Fox followed the prince's eyes to Balo, who glared at a bracelet in his palm. Fox grabbed Krystal's arm. "There it is. He has it."

"What?" Krystal looked over, seeing the bracelet, the bell sparkling in Balo's hand. She felt the power radiating off of it. "He knows. He knows we need it."

Balo took his terrified eyes off the bracelet and looked up at the prince.

The prince's grin crested. The little fox leapt from the ground, rushing at the monstrous bird, shoving into him with all his small strength. The giant bird lost his footing and toppled over, growling, grabbing Rayet and pulling him down with him. Two soldiers jumped to stop the prince.

Before anyone else could react a black dragon roared into the air above, flapping monstrous wings down toward the village. Hundreds of beaks and eyes shot upward.

Croy stepped back slowly. "Oh. My. God."

"Arc Ycrio!" Fox yelled and pulled Krystal protectively into him.

The crowds around the bonfire bolted in different directions. Birds squawked in panic and ran and shoved each other out of the way, baskets spilling. Armed soldiers pulled their bows and spears out, aiming arrows at the flying foreign evil.

"Falco!" Fox shouted.

Krystal shoved out of Fox's grip and ran to Falco who stood stunned. She fell on her knees and yanked Falco's pant leg up and pulled a gun off his shin clip, aiming up at the dragon, firing off several shots. The new sound of a blaster created more panic among the birds. Several shot their arrows off.

The dragon held a clawed hand out and caught each red laser, swooping and darting above rooftops, moving against the laws of physics. Each red beam bounced off his hand ten times larger, striking different thatch-roofed homes in the village, exploding and splintering in flames. One beam hit a crowd of fleeing birds, the dirt underneath them shooting up into the air launching the birds with it.

Falco grabbed the gun from Krystal. "Give me that! You're gonna get us killed!"

"You weren't doing anything!"

Fires burned, the village now in pandemonium. The elders fled off the stage, but the green-feathered one remained in her chair, watching with tired eyes as the dragon landed in the clearing amongst scattering villagers.

The prince, with Rayet's help, wrestled the bracelet from Balo. He looked up from the pinned bird and saw a great black dragon swooping along the ground toward him. Rayet dove out of the way, trying to grab the prince with him, but all he caught was the bracelet from his hand. The dragon came right through the fire, parting flames and its monstrous scaly hand with silver claws clutched the prince's narrow neck and pushed him across the clearing with some awesome power, the dragon's massive wings flapping along the ground. The prince's dragging heels sprayed dirt. The dragon slammed him against the stone altar and the prince cried out in agony. "Fox!" he choked and coughed.

Arc Ycrio pushed his face down to the prince's, burning yellow eyes. "Lito Orbion," his voice was deep and thick like black putrid ooze. His wings enveloped around him. "The escaped Prince of Titania. My pleasure is fleeting."

Rayet held the bracelet up. "I got it!" A fleeing villager shoved the ferret out of the way and it flew from his hands, landing somewhere in the dirt. Fox's eyes darted between Lito and Arc Ycrio to Rayet and Falco aiming his gun.

The prince bared his teeth at the dragon. "Fleeting, like your powers."

The dragon looked at his own hand grabbing the prince's neck, regarding the simple physicality of it. "Your journey through time ends here."

Horns bellowed in the distant skies. The dragon and the prince shot their view to the mountains where the sky filled with a swarm of flying creatures, great stingrays saddled with majestically dressed porpoises and calamari and sharks on their backs, guiding their fleet down toward the village in one large attacking wave.

"The Maloos!" the elder shouted getting up.

A crowned porpoise on a stingray's back aimed his scepter and blasted off a beam of blue energy. The beam cut through the air, down to the village and struck Arc Ycrio, throwing him into a villager's house. The dragon blasted through mud brick walls and burst out the other side and spun into the forest. Trees cracked and split in half, breaking apart under the massive dragon's body, wings and inertia. The King of Aquas waved his scepter in the air in elation, the sun glistening off its sapphire jewels.

"Fox! Rayet!" the prince shouted, catching his breath. "Someone get the bracelet!" His eyes darted upward to where the beam originated. "The King!"

Horns bellowed in the skies again. Hundreds of Yit took flight, aiming arrows and spears and other primitive weapons, and a battle ensued in the air above, avian and marine creatures of the ocean taking battle: arrows, and spears against beams of light and energy, wands, and scepters. The Yit were at a sore disadvantage even in the skies they should naturally command.

"I have it!" Krystal screamed over the commotion of hundreds of birds squawking. She held up the bracelet valiantly clutched from the dirt.

"Here!" the prince shouted, running to her with Fox, Falco and Croy.

Rayet turned to join but Balo grabbed his arms and twisted him around, shaking him. "You can't leave now! Our memories! This is when it happens! This is when we disappear!"

"What do I do?!" Rayet waved his arms. "The elders! Where did they go?!"

Balo spun around searching desperately.

"What is he talking about!?" Fox shouted amidst the chaos. "We have to get out of here now!"

"Let him go!" Falco growled and shoved Balo.

Rayet pushed Falco back. "No! You don't understand! I have to stay here! At least until-"

"Rayet!" Falco shouted. "What are you talking about?!"

"I have to remember!" Rayet yelled back. "I have to remember them! Balo, get the elders!"

"This way!" Balo took Rayet by the arm and pulled him away.

Falco stared dumbfounded until a stray arrow stabbed into the ground between him and Krystal. They glared at it and looked up, seeing the avian and marine creatures darting past each other in the skies above, exchanging arrows and lightning bolts.

"Croy!" Fox shouted. "Falco, Krystal! Cut ROB down from that pole!" He spun. "Lito! Get the King down here! Get him to take us where we need to go next!"

"The future!" the prince shouted and pointed up in the air. "He already knows!"

A stingray flapped gracefully low above the clearing and a nimble porpoise jumped off, landing in front of their group, his blue cape flaring. He brushed himself off and held his jeweled scepter up, tapping his blue velvet crown, straightening it.

"There is no time for full introductions," said the porpoise's high tinny voice. He was no taller than the prince. Fox looked down at him with surprise. "Suffice to say, I am King Aggidio and your friendly guide. An escape to the future I'd be happy to provide." He grinned and extended his hand to the prince who took it quickly. "I must shake your hand for a job well done. You've led your hero this far," he glanced at Fox with admiring gray eyes, "when the adventure's just begun."

Falco, Krystal, and Croy lugged ROB through the dirt as fast as they could, which amounted to a labored crawl.

"Thank you," ROB droned paralyzed. "I wasn't programmed with dignity."

"Okay! All here!" Falco shouted. "Can we please get the hell out of here?"

The porpoise king regarded the village in chaos. "I'm sorry your first impression of ancient Aquas had to be such a primitive locale."

A dragon shot out of the forest, his wings pulled back, cutting through the air over roofs. He pushed his talons out and crashed into the clearing again kicking up a mountain of dirt. He swooped around the fire, stalking toward the group.

The king spun into action, flinging his scepter out in his extended hand. The prince pulled the bracelet on his wrist and swiftly took his necklace off and looped it around his other wrist. He crossed his hands together, aiming both bells at the dragon.

The dragon relaxed and his silvery teeth came over his bottom lips in what amounted to a twisted grin. He stepped sideways, starting a circle around them.

The sound of birds, flapping stingrays, battle cries filled the skies above.

"Arc Ycrio," the king said gravely.

"King Aggidio," said the dragon.

"I've heard these days your powers are quite drained."

The dragon's teeth disappeared back into his mouth and his glowing yellow eyes narrowed. He watched the king's scepter, and the prince's wrists as he slowly circled. "Are they? Perhaps I am enjoying this physical form." He regarded the prince. "He hid well. Corneria's destruction was necessary. The escape was unexpected. Yet impressive."

"Indeed." The king followed with his scepter. "So was yours. Destroying a world, figuring out the next location, traveling over a billion years, all by your lonesome self." He shook his head pitiably. "You must be exhausted."

The dragon continued to circle and ignored the porpoise king, turning his attention to Lito, "Now. Let's not be tired. There is no reason in seeking the bells Orbion. It is destiny for me to have them. The people of Titania have willed this to happen. They want a leader that isn't your royal highness."

The prince bristled at his name being uttered in such a wide evil voice. "They don't want a dictator either. You'll only enslave them."

"They're already enslaved," Arc Ycrio seethed. "I am their liberator. Give me the bells and I will let you live in an ordered Titania and Lylat under me. Each of you." He regarded Fox and the rest of the group for the first time.

Fox and the group stood frozen, caught in a tense middle ground, a political tête-à-tête they didn't quite understand.

The prince didn't budge, following the dragon with his outstretched wrists pressed together. "You don't really think I'd do that."

The dragon stopped pacing, standing firmly. He looked upward and regarded the aerial battle, then returned his gaze to the prince. "Yes. Or everyone will die."

Far on the other side of the clearing, on the other side of the bonfire, Balo and Rayet rushed up to the only elder who didn't flee. But she was already approaching them from the stone altar, understanding what was needed.

"It is not your allies I fear as the enemy," said the elder to Rayet as she hobbled to him. She was ancient and even shorter than he was. "It is the enemy of all." She looked on in the distance through the flickering flames at the beastly dragon's back. "I now see it wasn't the Maloos who would be our demise as we've expected all these years, or the Anua who give them power. It is this black creature of the future, who seeks universal supremacy over all. The enemy of my enemy is not my friend when he results in my own destruction."

Balo put his hand on Rayet's head. "Elder. This creature, he is our hope. We must-"

"I know your thoughts Balo," the old woman interrupted. "I understand what needs to be done. I understand this creature's mind."

She looked up at Rayet and her wrinkled eyes smiled at him. "I carry the memories of each Elder, who in turn carry the memories of every village. Every Yit that has lived." She glanced at the dragon through the fire, and the porpoise king of the Maloos, at Fox and the group. They didn't notice them, still caught in their tense petty bickering. "Despite his presence, you have already won here," she said tired and gravely. "The King of the Maloos has the power to save you. This evil will be blunted again, left behind in his own rage, his own self-wallow of destruction. Which is how our world will perish. But you will return to the future."

Rayet watched the crowd on the other side of the bonfire, then glanced at the battle above. He returned his attention to the feathered elder in front of him. "I'm willing to take your memories," he said with eager determination.

She smiled and let go of her walking stick. It flopped down into the dirt and she took hold of the ferret's head. Rayet closed his eyes, and when the thoughts reached his mind, he experienced unending millennia, hundreds and thousands of lives and deaths.

On the other side of the bonfire, the bickering continued. Arc Ycrio pointed a claw at the prince. "If your wish is to draw this out, this pathetic bumbling journey through time, then when I acquire all four bells and rule over all, I will have no desire to keep Corneria. I will destroy it a billion times over and wipe it off the face of every universe."

Fox laughed, "We don't care. If you win I hope you wipe it off the face of every universe. I'd rather die a billion times and never exist than live under your reign."

The dragon faltered for a second, his eyes scanning between Fox, Lito, and King Aggidio. He returned his gaze to Fox and his teeth came over his bottom lip again in his seething glistening smirk. "I see Prince Orbion has told you that the destruction of your Corneria is inconsequential, that there are an infinite number of Cornerias for you to return to." He smiled at the prince as well, then back to Fox. "What a calculated lie."

Fox kept his intense glare on Arc Ycrio but Krystal, Falco and Croy glanced at Lito, who grimaced at the dragon.

Arc Ycrio continued, "Yes. You might be able to go back to 'a' future, but it will not be 'your' future. Every Corneria is different. When you go back to 'your' time, you will find a vastly different reality from the one you knew. Your Corneria is forever gone."

Krystal smirked, "It doesn't a matter. I was already willing to sacrifice my future to save everyone else's."

"Brave. Valiant," the dragon said. "But so very selfish." He pointed a silver claw at Krystal. "You have the luxury of time travel. With Prince Orbion and King Aggidio's help you can jump back and forth to any time you wish, any Corneria you wish. These natives, like the rest of Lylat, do not have such power or luxury. There is only one Aquas for them."

King Aggidio shook his scepter at the dragon. "You won't destroy Aquas. You don't have the power."

The dragon smirked. "I do."

He lunged on his knee and pounded two scaly fists into the ground. They sunk into the dirt up to his elbows. Black misting energy snaked through the dirt, spider-webbing past them. He looked up fiercely grinning. "It will just be slow."

The King sent a blast out of his scepter and it hit the dragon in the chest, launching him back through the village, but the damage had been done. An ethereal black poison pooled on the ground where Arc Ycrio had penetrated, slowly bubbling up and expanding in streaks devouring the dirt. The king, the prince, everyone stepped back, giving it room.

The prince glared at the crowned porpoise. "What is this?!"

The king didn't take his urgent eyes off the growing goop and they continued stepping back cautiously. "You and your friends must leave immediately." He looked up at each of them.

"You can't stop this?!" the prince begged. "But Ycrio is right! This is the only Aquas where the Maloos evolved and existed, the Yit too! They'll be lost forever!"

"What?" Fox choked. "How is that possible? There has to be billions of Aquas's with your people on them. The Aquas in my time, there are ruins. I've seen the ruins under the ocean with my own eyes."

The King looked at Fox grimly "No. This past is your past. We are on the same string as you. That is why you see ruins. But our existence is unique. This string is unique to us." He held his scepter up and it caught sunlight, sparkling purple. "We only have one."

"You have the power!" the prince implored. "I have the power! We can stop this evil."

"We need that very same power to get you out of here."

A massive stingray with saddle seats swooped down at the far end of the clearing. The king spun his scepter, catching it under his arm. "This is my chariot, come quickly! And do mind the tail!" They ran to the spotted flying creature. The growing goop picked up pace and the bonfire fell into it, fizzling, wood and flames disappearing in a flash of black mist.

Falco hesitated. "No! Where's Rayet!"

At the other end, the green-feathered elder let go of Rayet's head and the ferret gasped, falling to his knees, weakened and delirious. Balo and the elder eyed the growing black goop coming toward them.

"This is it," the elder said calmly. "This is our end." She looked at Balo. "Save him."

Balo scooped Rayet from the dirt and looked around madly and saw King Aggidio, Prince Orbion and the group running toward a landed stingray at the far end of the clearing. He ran toward them, huffing and adjusting Rayet in his arms as he jostled him around, moving his legs as fast as they could carry both of them.

The elder stood calmly as the black goop touched her feet, cold and icy and enveloped her. She disappeared in a black mist, splashing down into it.

Balo huffed and huffed, the black goop was picking up speed. It gurgled behind his talons in a low trickling wave over the dirt expanding in every direction. A blue bird was running toward him.

"Rayet!" Falco shouted. "Rayet!"

"I have him!" Balo said. "Take him to future!"

Falco rushed up and held his arms out and Balo dumped the ferret into his arms. "Tell him to remember us!"

"What?!" Falco yelled.

"Just go!" Balo cried. "There is no time!"

Falco stepped back clutching Rayet close to his chest, staring at the intense blue eyes of the albatross as they eyed the ferret in his arms. They were filled with a mix of love and regret and desperation that Falco couldn't read.

"Come with us!" Falco suddenly blurted.

Balo resisted, but considered. "I can't. I don't belong-" The black goop caught up with the beastly bird's feet and ran up his talons to his legs and he cried out and sprayed into a black mist that fell and joined the growing wave.

Falco clenched his eyes shut and ran back toward the stingray with Rayet in his arms.

"C'mon!" Fox shouted, waving to Falco.

Croy dragged ROB up and with all the strength in his broad arms and back he lugged the robot onto the stingray's back, his face beet red with exhaustion. "When we get through this, you're going on a diet."

"Very funny," ROB stuttered.

Arc Ycrio, far in the village, regained his senses and leapt onto a roof and perched himself, watching the group small and tiny in the distance flee from the growing black energy. He tried to control his panting, drained and exhausted. He cringed, watching the group jump onto the broad stingray's back, taking their seats in the saddles.

King Aggidio took the reins and he snapped them and the stingray flapped hard in response, slowly rising into the air under all their weight. The black goop spread exponentially, sweeping across the ground only a few feet under the stingray. The wave swept through the village and into the forests and swooped over rooftops and Arc Ycrio but he remained untouched by his own power.

Fox held Krystal close as they rose over the trees. The flapping wings of the stingray whooshed back and forth around them and they watched the terrain, astonished as the black sludge gurgled over hills and treetops and mountains keeping pace with them.

"Faster!" Falco shouted over the wind, holding Rayet close. Rayet drifted from side to side in Falco's protective arms, semi-conscious, but he blinked awake, getting his bearings and his surroundings, realizing he was up in the air rising toward the clouds. Falco frantically pulled the rope jewelry off the ferret's arms, tossing it aside, trying to free Rayet of whatever influence he was put under. "Rayet! Rayet can you hear me?"

The ferret stirred, tiredly looking up at Falco. "I know," he said suddenly smiling. "I know them."

Croy sat on top of ROB's sprawled body to save room and braced himself on the robot's arms as tightly as he could. "This doesn't feel safe!" He looked behind him seeing only a small rear seat preventing him and ROB from sliding into a swooshing deadly tail.

ROB's eyes scanned the large pig sitting on him. "When we get through this, _you're_ going on a diet."

The porpoise king held his scepter up again and their speed increased, the slow flapping of the stingray not matching their growing sonic velocity.

Fox shouted over the wind, "Lito! Tell the king we have to go to the future with the Great Fox! We need our ship!"

"I already know!" The porpoise shouted up front, slapping his reins. "I'm already working on it!"

Krystal clenched her eyes shut. They whooshed through a cloud, now amidst a new terrain of cauliflower clouds below and wispy streaks above. Krystal looked down and through breaks in the clouds she saw a city of white pillars and roads and castles and waterfalls, every structure tall and of brilliant white stone. "What is that?!"

The king hung onto his crown and looked over the side. "Alcushire!"

"It's beautiful!"

"I wish you could have seen it a little more closely! But alas no time!"

Lito grabbed a hold of the king's shoulders. "You have to come to the future with us! You can't stay here!"

"I can't!" the porpoise shouted. If he weren't shouting, his tone might have been somber. "I only have the power to send you and your ship!"

"Forget the ship!" Fox shouted. "We'll send all of us!"

"It's not enough!" King Aggidio yelled.

"Where are we going?!" Croy shouted from the rear.

"Corneria!" the king announced. "About two hundred years in your past!"

"Corneria?!" Fox echoed, elated at the familiar name.

The clouds faded underneath them. The black swampy energy swooped over the hills and crashed into the stone streets and castles of Alcushire and picked up even more speed, sweeping and spreading out over the land from horizon to horizon. The sun glistened dully off the smooth ocean of black goop. "It's almost gone!" the prince shouted.

King Aggidio closed his eyes and held his scepter up with both hands. "With all my might and all my power, guide these warriors to their newest hour!"

Falco shook Rayet who slumped in the bird's chest in a daze. "Rayet speak to me! What do you mean you know them?!" He looked up desperately. "They've done something to Rayet!"

The king continued. "To the future, to their home, to the time when they rightly roam!"

Rayet smiled at Falco deliriously. "They'll live forever. In me."

"Something's happening!" Krystal yelled. The stingray's flapping continued lazily, but their speed increased even more, thin wispy clouds streaking past them. Purple light and energy dazzled off the king's scepter, surrounding all of them as they rose even higher, moving above the wispy clouds. The prince, with the bells still on his wrists, leaned against the regal porpoise's back and reached over his head to hold the scepter from behind, joining their energy.

"To Corneria!" The king shouted. "To Corneria!"

"If you can't come to Corneria!" The prince shouted into the king's ear. "I'm at least saving you from Aquas!"

"You don't have the power!" King Aggidio shouted back. "You risk everything!"

"Life is risk!"

The Great Fox roared from behind over them, engines glowing and thundering. Clumps of sand slipped off the bottom of its hull and ocean water poured out of its hangar whisking away in the wind. Their stingray flapped and trailed behind as the ship zoomed ahead faster, spraying water and sand on them, the massive engines bright and deafening. King Aggidio guided it with his scepter and made a war cry lost in the roar and wind. The scepter in his hands boomed out with purple energy enveloping everything they could see. The Prince joined his cry and the bells burned on his wrists. Fox pulled his arms around Krystal as tightly as he could. Ice crystals from the water formed on their fur. The sky darkened to sunlit blackness. The feeling of the stingray's back underneath him faded, until he looked down and saw it actually was fading, seeing the black dull terrain miles below. He felt the same powerful tingling he felt when the prince first took them through time.

With King Aggidio, they all yelled in a rising pitch until light and energy took them with the Great Fox, zooming off into the black above, out of Aquas's atmosphere, away from the black fading planet and into the stars.

The King and the stingray disappeared in explosions of light emanating from the bells on the prince's wrists. Fox, Krystal, Lito, Falco, Rayet, Croy, and ROB's ethereal forms blasted through space at incredible speed and merged with the Great Fox's glowing structure, swirling with pure colors and energy through stars and comets, primordial dust and electric strings of time.

Fox held his arms out like a bird and looked over at Krystal and she looked back, only seeing two eyes and light, the radiant outline of her body streaking against the shimmering shell of the ship and the colorful lines the stars made. Solar zoomed past them. Then Katina, swirling and brown.

The prince twisted his body, spinning elated, leaving helices of golden sparkling energy in his wake.

Falco held Rayet's ghostly glowing form in his arms of energy and kept his eyes on the space ahead through the radiant glass outline of the Great Fox. A spinning blue orb in the distance grew and grew until he could make out clouds swirling in fast-forward and oceans and the familiar green continents and night-side lights of Corneria growing and growing and growing and growing.

* * *

I sigh with relief at another brilliant escape, but new treacherous perils are sure to take shape. 

You are going to a time on Corneria more perilous than Fox knows.

A time of industry and deceit, greed and nasty foes.

I'm sorry your hasty arrival on Aquas was too late,

For you to enjoy a stay more sedate.

Arc Ycrio's rage grows and his progress wanes,

Prove to him his lust for power can't make up for his lack of brains.


	6. Return to Corneria I

Sorry it took me a while. School has been taking up a lot of my time.

* * *

**VI**

Orange light of the setting sun spread across thousands of cars rushing down a 22 lane freeway, one of many lifelines in and out of downtown Corneria City. Skyscrapers stood in the distance in front of mountains. The ocean was visible through ridges and between towering buildings. Along the freeway, mast lights fifty meters tall illuminated the concrete river. The artery weaved through a corridor of shorter office towers.

On the freeway, a young wolf hummed along at 100 k.p.h. with the closely-packed traffic. He yielded into the far right lanes to pay the upcoming toll. He rested his elbow on the window sill and his chin on his palm and watched the cars in the automatic toll lanes blur by through the plaza. He eyed his rear-view mirror, sneering at a truck edging as close to the back of his car as possible.

A gap formed in front of him, but he checked the rear-view mirror again to watch his tail-gaiter. In the distance above the corridor of office buildings, a bright light caught his eye.

Coming down from the dark purple sky, a mesh of sparkling energy, gold and brilliant fireworks, formed the outline a large bulbous airplane, but the swirling energy was so chaotic there was nothing he could make of it.

The car behind him honked. He ignored him.

At first he thought it was a plane on fire, likely breaking apart. His heart leapt at the thought. Then it seemed to lose its glow, as though the fire or plasma covering it was extinguishing. Suddenly the form was metallic, but it still glowed brilliant with golden energy. It was certainly a ship of some sort, and it was coming closer. The red sunlight caught its silvery hull and added to its brilliance. It was flying in fast, right toward the freeway as though it were landing there like it was a plane, but it looked nothing like a plane. The bulbous ship didn't look aerodynamic at all and the wolf wondered how it could have been flying in the first place, though at the present moment it appeared to be falling more than flying.

The ship swooped right over the roof of an office building, barely missing antennas. The ship's glow reflected off the glass of the office towers. The wolf now realized how close it was. Several cars speeding along in the automatic lanes took notice of the ship in their mirrors and swerved out of the way in different directions. There was too much traffic to maneuver. One car side-swiped into another. Another hit another, then another, like packs of animals shoving each other out of the way, but at 100 k.p.h. they were losing control, skidding around, veering off, slamming into embankment walls and water-filled barrels that protected the pillars of the toll plaza. Water sprayed onto the wolf's windshield, but he didn't notice, he was still entranced by the landing spectacle.

** -.-.- **

Fox, on the bridge of the Great Fox, gained consciousness, slowly coming to awareness. He was floating in the middle of the rattling bridge, still part energy. Everything rattled. The chairs shook like they would break from the floor, deck panels, the consoles, everything vibrated at their bolts, but he floated calmly. Through the bridge window, he saw the river of concrete, painted lane stripes, and escaping ground vehicles, all rapidly approaching.

"Falco!" he shouted. His voice rippled ghostly away from him and he grabbed at the back of the captain's chair. His hand swooped through it, pulling trails of sparkling gold fibers from his fingers. Fox glared at his surprising disconnect with the ship. The ship shook so violently, the groan of metal tearing and bending was heart-wrenching. It had never taken this much abuse, not this sustained. The ship had to be breaking apart.

Or maybe it was coming back together.

"Anti-gravity!" Fox shouted again. "Stabilizers! Something! Now!"

Falco was strangely back to fully solid form. He pulled himself into his chair and was bounced around. "I can't get a response!" he cried over moaning rattling metal. "Nothing's responding!" He pounded the console. Warning sirens drowned his voice.

The prince's golden form floated down through the ceiling. Fox tried to swim toward him. "Lito do something!" He shouted.

The prince didn't know what to make of the alien landscape outside the window. The view of twinkling office buildings in the distance in front of dark purple mountains was a beautiful sight while the armada of foreign vehicles speeding along below them was a terrifying one. He knew the solid smooth rock they drove on would be unforgiving, especially at their speed of descent.

He couldn't see any of their time strings. He was too weak. He hoped they still had some, opportunities of survival. They couldn't have traveled so far only to fail. He imagined a hundred things to do to stop their destruction, but when he even tried to push that part of his mind he felt an intense burning pain from his eartips to his toes. He cried out in anguish and Fox knew something was terribly wrong. The prince grimaced and exhaled painfully. After sending everyone to and from Aquas over a billion years, his mind and body and essence were too drained. "Brace," the prince growled, "for impact."

"What's going on?!" Krystal cried. She was fully solid like Falco and had pulled herself into a chair.

"We're home!" Croy yelled, also solid and pulling a seat belt on.

"100 meters!" Falco shouted. "We have 8 seconds to figure something out!"

Rayet was drifting through the air, golden energy still. He watched the flocks of cars outside the window speeding ahead of the ship, clearly trying to get out of the way. He spread his arms like a bird and closed his eyes and smiled.

"60 meters!" Krystal yelled. "Can we get the solar converters online?!"

Fox swiped at his shaking chair again, feeling his arm become more solid. It passed a little slower through the chair, but not enough to get a grip. "Solar power is useless! The sun is going down!"

"So's the ship," Croy said flatly, but no one heard him through the sirens.

Fox swiped at a console, but his hand and forearm still futilely rippled through it like smoke. Even if he could use it, he hadn't the slightest idea of what to do in such short time. "Lito?! Anything?!"

Before the prince could respond the left wing of the Great Fox clipped a freeway mast lights. slicing the pole clean in half. The floodlights exploded over the ship. The sound of tearing metal and the shower of sparks shooting up the window was enough to confirm a frightening fact: the ship was solid enough to crash. The mast light's crown splintered off the top of the pole, bounced off the back of the Great Fox, spun through the air and slammed into the freeway. Cars swerved around it before a lumbering semi-truck barreled straight into it. The cab exploded in a billowing blast, and the trailer launched into the air, then jack-knifed over, swooping along the road, taking several cars with it.

Falco grabbed his seat and clenched his eyes shut. Croy could see the altimeter at ROB's empty console tick down to a single digit number and he too shut his eyes.

There was a rattling silent calm from everyone just before the belly of the ship scrapped the road. Concrete shattered apart from the freeway and rushed like a wave in front of the ship. Then the ship dug in.

Rayet's ghostly form whooshed through the front window in a spinning streak of light unaffected by the ship's halting inertia. Fox and the prince's form did the same.

Krystal was jostled violently in her seat and she shrieked at the sight of Fox, Prince Orbion, and Rayet shooting out the front window, but the glass didn't break. Consoles exploded around her and sparks showered her as the ship grinded along. Her shoulders dug into her restraints. The nose of the ship started to tilt forward.

Rayet opened his eyes and he saw himself flying along the freeway, only a few meters above the strange ground vehicles that sped along with him. Their shadows were long in the evening light. A large cargo truck lumbered past him and he traced his fingers across the roof of the trailer. Golden sparks sprayed where his fingers touched.

He felt his form slowing until he came to a hover above the road, floating down until his feet gently touched the concrete. He felt himself become solid. The glow faded. He touched his fur, and it tingled. He was real again. He smiled and shook out his fur happily and looked up from his hands and turned around. Bright headlights bathed him, a swarm of cars roared toward him. Behind those cars, the towering Great Fox blew through the toll plaza, shattering the building and tearing down tall mast lights like toothpicks with a storm of concrete, metal and tossed cars in front of it.

The ferret raised his little palms up to stop the blinding lights and took an uneasy step back.

"Rayet!" Fox shouted. He had also landed gently on the freeway several lanes over. The blur of a car sped between him and the ferret.

Rayet looked over terrified and Fox bolted to him. Another car zipped by with its horn blaring. Fox dashed past Rayet, grabbing his arm, nearly pulling it out of its socket and tugged him across several lanes. A truck skidded around them, tires screaming at them. Its hubcap flew off, bouncing once with a spark, flying inches over the ferret's head. Fox didn't look sideways to the chaos approaching, focused intently on reaching the edge of the highway that seemed to stretch like a sea of gray.

Several cars screeched and swerved around them, tires sputtering in coughs against concrete, avoiding desperately the two people dashing across the road.

Fox growled, baring his teeth, pushing himself to a physical extreme, boots pounding. He couldn't feel Rayet's dead weight or his own burning legs.

The ferret cried in pain and saw the Great Fox and its tsunami of destruction encroaching. The nose of the ship pitched forward and hit the highway, ripping up a new trail of concrete like sand. Rayet squealed noisily, confused and horrified. Fox could barely hear it amid the crunch of concrete, glass, and metal coming around them. He whipped Rayet in front of him and swung him over the concrete barrier of the highway. The ferret hit a steep grassy hill hard and rolled down. Fox threw himself over just as the Great Fox and its wave roared through.

Fox hit the hill shoulder first and barrel-rolled down as a cloud of dust boiled into his view. Rock-sized chunks of concrete pelted his body from all around and felt like they were breaking the bones in his body. He wished he was immaterial again. A black car flipped over them almost gracefully and smashed hood first into the grass and bounced down with a violent crunch each time, tumbling over itself. It reached the intersection at the bottom of the hill and slammed into a street light, taking it down. Cars on the intersecting streets swerved around each other in a deadly dance.

Fox felt the hill leveling out as he rolled and rolled until he spun right into a soft furry form. It was Rayet, splayed out on the curb of the street. The ferret coughed and cried out in pain and made a mix of broken words and squeals as horns and cars smashed into each other around them.

Fox coughed, "You're okay!" he shouted and grabbed him. "You're okay! Rayet! You're okay!"

Rayet pointed past Fox and screeched again. A freeway mast light was toppling over them like a falling tree, cutting through the bilious dust. Fox shielded Rayet's head and the top of the mast light smashed into a van in the intersection, halting the tree-sized metal pillar inches above Fox and Rayet. A curtain of sparks engulfed them, then sizzled out in the grass.

Back on the freeway the prince had landed further down the road but was still pure energy. He took a step back and cringed. A car wailing its horn zoomed right through him like a ghost, pulling golden strings of energy with it. They snapped and contorted back to the little fox's shape like rubber. The wave of concrete, cars, and the Great Fox's nose tumbled right over him, he grabbed his chest in reflex to protect himself. He whooshed through the bridge and for a flash he saw Falco bracing, Krystal screaming, Croy pinned in his seat covering his face, until he passed through decks and metal beams, the engine room, and out the back of the ship, in a comet tail of dust and debris. White dust started to collect on his glowing fur which told him he was materializing, not a moment too soon.

He covered his muzzle and coughed through the filth. He knew for sure he was fully solid again when he could taste the stinging choking air on his tongue. He lifted himself up onto a jagged broken slab of concrete and tried to figure a way out of the torn up freeway, out of the darkening acrid cloud of dust. The rumbling of the Great Fox slowed and deepened until he couldn't feel it beneath his feet anymore. It had finally grinded to a stop and he thought he heard a wheeze from it. It might have been his own exasperated exhale.

Everything was still and quiet, aside from the scattered vehicles around him blaring horns in a ruckus. Their horns wailed like metronomes in a messy chorus. Some of the cars were upside down and he could see people clamoring out of their windows. He thought to help but before he could take a step, his head went light and fuzzy and he fainted.

** -.-.- **

Krystal frantically unbuckled her seatbelt as dust billowed into the bridge through the shattered front window. She was unharmed, and so was Falco who rubbed his head and grimaced in irritation at the ruined bridge. "If we're on Corneria 200 years in the past, then we're definitely screwed."

"Forget it!" Krystal barked, pulling herself out of her seat. "We have to move!" She nearly lost her balance on the steeply tilted bridge. The large open window provided a clean escape.

Falco ignored her and climbed up the bridge to where Croy was sitting.

The pig huffed and puffed in shock, but was okay. "Great landing Falco," he muttered.

Falco growled, "Blame the prince for another well-executed arrival."

Krystal turned around in the jagged opening at the front of the bridge. Her boots crunched on the broken glass. "Guys we gotta move! Emergency responders are going to get here any minute and we can't be seen as the people driving the ship!"

Croy stepped carefully down the steep bridge, grabbing onto different chairs and consoles and even dangling wires to balance his weight. "What about Fox and Rayet and the prince?"

Krystal swerved around and tried to fan the dust out of her view. She studied the desolate freeway ahead filled with shattered slabs of concrete and tossed cars. "I don't know. They're somewhere out there. They just flew right out the window when we hit."

Croy reached the opening with Falco. "That's reassuring."

They clamored over debris in the choking burning dust, getting as far away from the ship as possible. Sirens sounded in the distance.

A loud flapping chopped overhead until it was right above them. They looked up at the strange flying machine. A spotlight switched on and scanned the freeway, inspecting the scene until it reached the Great Fox and stopped, mulling over its hull.

"Emergency responders," Krystal guessed. The sirens got closer until they saw the emergency vehicles. Several large boxy vehicles with red and white flashing lights slowed down the other side of the freeway, careful to avoid bewildered victims, shuffling across the freeway. One ambulance stopped within a dozen meters of the group.

"Just act like you're a victim," Falco said.

"Yeah that's not hard to do," Croy said. "Especially since we're completely unharmed."

Falco glared at him, "Would you like me to harm you?"

** -.-.- **

Fox clamored up from the grass, covered in a chalky substance and pellets of broken concrete and glass. He patted his jacket sending up puffs of dust to add to the swirling cloud around them. Rayet had passed out. He checked the ferret's pulse and the breathing from his nose. He was fine. His first thought was to Krystal and the ship and he clamored up the embankment to the freeway and saw the destruction. It looked like a total loss. So much for getting King Aggidio to bring The Great Fox. Screw the ship, all that mattered was Krystal, Falco, and Croy. He hoped there'd be some way to salvage the ship here, but with it being so blatantly in public, having caused so much public destruction, he wondered what its fate would be now.

He looked back at Rayet and was startled to see someone was kneeling over him, checking him just as Fox had done. "Hey!" Fox yelled, scampering back down the embankment. "Get away from him."

The woman feline who was checking Rayet clamored up from the ferret and stepped back afraid. Fox noticed her strange clothes, a strange very square business suit top, with what seemed like shoulder pads and then a skirt to her knees. All black. Her attire only made her more foreign and threatening.

"I was only trying to help," she said exasperated.

"He's fine."

There were others shuffling around distraught in the intersection. "He's not okay," said a man Fox hadn't noticed, a rottweiler who had just walked up. He pointed to an upside down car. It was the black luxury car that could have killed Fox and Rayet earlier when it flew over them; the one that had literally dominoed into the intersection. He could see a young wolf, hanging upside down in his driver seat, unconscious, and suddenly that pesky instinct to help others kicked in.

His conscience pulled him to Krystal, but the young white wolf was right there. He could have walked away, but he had to help. He clenched his eyes shut and felt Krystal again. His instincts told him she could handle herself. He thought of all the times she had told him this; that she was all right. These instincts came once in a while. He never knew what to make of them. Krystal once said it was 'Kxo leaso ev kxo xouhk' or 'The voice of the heart.' He wasn't a good listener, but now his voice was telling him to help this young man.

His legs started moving and soon he was on his knees, pulling this wolf out of his car. The rottweiler helped. They laid the wolf out on the concrete, gently.

"He's breathing," the rottweiler said.

Fox thought through a distant memory of his military training, first-aid. He scanned over his body, but the wolf seemed all right, no serious injury, just lots of scratches and bruises. The car had an airbag of some sort that must have cushioned the wolf when his car hit the embankment and then the street light. Fox marveled at how something so primitive could save this wolf from serious injury.

Just then the wolf grumbled and reached for his forehead.

"You're all right," the rottweiler said. "You've been in an accident."

"Great," the wolf grumbled.

The rottweiler offered to call an ambulance for him but the wolf refused. Fox helped him to his feet and the rottweiler left to get information from someone who had rear-ended his car. The white-furred wolf thanked Fox for his assistance and they both surveyed the destruction in the intersection and up the freeway.

"What the hell is it?" the wolf asked.

"I'm not sure," Fox said, eyeing the same panorama of devastation. "Some alien ship maybe." Fox cringed to himself at the silly speculation.

The wolf looked at Fox with surprise. "Alien!" He laughed. "That'd be something. It looks more like an experimental military craft of some sort. If that's the case, they got quite a cover-up to work on," he said with a somewhat sarcastic bite in his voice. The wolf looked at his totaled upside-down car. "And they better pay for this."

Rayet approached stumbling and Fox quickly helped him, "It's just nerves Rayet, you'll be okay."

The ferret looked at Fox tired and sad, "Aquas." Fox could barely hear him. "Take me back to Aquas, please," he pleaded.

The wolf studied Rayet and Fox, and their strange clothing, Fox's green flight pants, a white flight jacket and a red scarf tied around his neck. Rayet was in tattered clothes, had strangely dried blue paint on him and seemed filthy, but everyone's fur was coated with white dust anyway. "What's he saying?" the wolf asked.

"Nothing," Fox said quickly. "He's just a little shaken up from the accident. Our car… we barely made it."

"Where's your car?"

Fox looked back to the freeway. There were at least six flying machines hovering over the freeway with spotlights. They were loud. There were hundreds of flashing blue and yellow lights from emergency vehicles on the road itself. "Up there somewhere."

"Well, where were you guys headed? Are you from here?"

Fox thought of an answer, "No, we're from out of town, passing through."

Rayet sighed almost painfully, "I'm tired. I hurt."

It was almost dark now. The wolf scratched his head and looked at his totaled car again, then at Fox and Rayet. "You must have somewhere to stay, right?"

Rayet looked at Fox pleadingly, wondering the same. Fox wasn't sure how to answer, but the wolf could read Rayet's look and held his hand up. "I tell you what, I have unlimited tow truck service. I'll give them a call. You guys can ride back with me; maybe stay at my apartment until you figure out what to do and how to move on. It's the most I can do for your help."

Fox's heart leapt at the wolf's sudden gesture of kindness and trust, but his thoughts strayed back to Krystal and the rest of the group. Fox nodded and the wolf dialed a number on his phone.

Fox rubbed Rayet's head trying to get some of the dust off. It was futile as more dust blew through. "Rayet I'm going to go check out what's on the freeway. Stay here with…" Fox looked at the wolf.

The wolf looked from his phone. "Eli," he said.

Fox introduced himself as well, then dashed up the embankment to the freeway, trying to study the wreckage, looking for Krystal on the freeway. Her blue fur stood out in any calamity. A large eagle in a camouflaged uniform blocked Fox's view, approaching with a hand held out. "Sir. Go back down to the street. Return to your vehicle. Everyone is being moved away from the site."

Fox tried to look past the soldier. "My car is somewhere up there."

"Sir, emergency crews are already taking care of it."

Fox would have argued, mentioned his friends were up there, but the eagle brushed a strange rifle that was strapped around his arm. Fox had only seen something so primitive in old movies. It was a deadly weapon. He knew the eagle was serious. The military. They would be taking control of the scene. An alien spaceship crashing in the middle of a city was no easy situation to contain.

Fox looked back at Eli, who was talking to Rayet. Rayet seemed quiet and forlorn. The ferret looked up at the sky and the wolf seemed confused, then looked down to check his phone again. Fox worried about Rayet, wondering what the Yit had done to his mind. Falco must have been worried sick too, especially now that he was separated from him. At least for now in this strange foreign time he and Rayet had somewhere to go and recuperate. Fox fumbled for his PADD in his jacket as he steadied himself down the embankment. He switched the PADD to roaming communication, using old radio bands. His voice would be heard on Falco or Krystal's communicator, but there was no response. He realized Krystal or Falco would have to switch their PADDs to the same mode for it to work.

They would be separated for now, with no way to contact each other. Fox hoped Prince Orbion would be able to figure something out.

From the embankment, Fox looked back at downtown Corneria City. The buildings were different and strange, simple rectangles and geometric shapes and spires. They were tall, but nowhere near the height of those in the future. He could tell from where the buildings were among the mountains that this downtown was the old city. The valley it sat in would eventually be flooded by a rising ocean a hundred years from now. But before that could happen, the city would migrate up the valley and the old city would become historic ruins and newly constructed platform structures over the water. The sky looked empty. No flying cars in this time. He saw factories to the west, tall looming smokestacks spewing soot and pollution into the dark evening sky.

He sighed and started back toward Rayet and Eli just as a tow-truck arrived. There were several other tow-trucks scattered throughout the road. Eli waved to Fox.

They would have to be careful in this time, and he hoped Krystal, Falco, Croy, and Prince Orbion understood the stakes as well. Then there was the looming issue of Arc Ycrio. Fox had a feeling they hadn't seen the last of him.


End file.
